The Jordanian government says it has arrested a fourth would-be suicide bomber in the attacks Wednesday on three international hotels in Amman. The deputy prime minister says the attacker in custody is the wife of one of the other bombers.
Jordanian Deputy Prime Minister Marwan Muasher says authorities have arrested a woman who was supposed to be the fourth suicide bomber.
He says she accompanied her husband to the Radisson hotel on Wednesday, where a wedding reception was in progress. They were both wearing suicide belts, but hers failed to explode.
Mr. Muasher said the two were dressed like wedding guests, indicating that they knew they would be attacking a wedding party.
"Both had explosive belts around their waists. His wife attempted to detonate the belt after they went in the wedding room, but failed to do so. Her husband asked her to leave the wedding party," said Mr. Muasher. "Once she did, he detonated himself successfully."
Mr. Muasher displayed photographs of the suicide belt that the woman wore, which was filled with ball-bearings to produce shrapnel.
"As you can see, an enlarged picture here also shows the metal balls that were also attached to the belt, so that they can inflict the largest number of casualties," he said.
Mr. Muasher declined to say where and how the woman was arrested. He identified her as Sajida Mubarak Atrous al-Rishawi, the sister of a slain al-Qaida militant from Anbar province in Iraq. Mr. Muasher said her brother, who was killed in Fallujah, was once the right-hand man of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, whose terrorist group, al-Qaida in Iraq, has claimed responsibility for the hotel bombings.
Her husband, the bomber who died at the Radisson, was identified as Ali Hussein al-Shimeri. The other two attackers were named as Safar Mohammed Ali and Rawadd Jasim Mohammed Abid.
He says all of them were Iraqi nationals.
The attacks on the Radisson, Grand Hyatt, and Days Inn hotels killed 57 people and sparked outraged protests on the streets of Jordan.
