Day: December 29, 2009

The State Department says counterterrorism agencies were warned that the Nigerian man who allegedly tried to blow up an airliner Christmas Day may be under extremists’ influence.

State Department spokesman Ian Kelly says it was up to the National Counterterrorism Center to coordinate the interagency effort that would have blocked 23-year-old Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab from entering the U.S. He says U.S. counterterror agencies received the information on Nov. 20, a day after it was provided by the father, but it was not enough to revoke the visa.

Kelly says officials get thousands of negative messages about people that are not always accurate.

He says Abdulmutallab got the two-year tourist visa in 2008 because he had money, was attending a reputable school and had visited the U.S. before.

President Barack Obama has ordered a review of how U.S. intelligence organizations keep the skies safe — or don’t, as demonstrated by a failed Christmas Day attack on a Detroit-bound flight from Amsterdam.

Obama has not yet tapped someone to head the multi-agency probe, but White House officials acknowledge the recent incident involving a 23-year-old Nigerian with alleged ties to terrorists has made clear there are plenty of failed areas to examine. The suspect, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, was on one advisory list, but never caught the attention of U.S. counter terrorist screeners despite his father’s warnings to U.S. Embassy officials in Nigeria last month.