Suspected terrorists may have sneaked into Andhra

After the arrest of Al Qaeda operative Abdul Rehman from Tangi-Choudwar near Cuttack, Odisha police has been very busy in searching terrorist links in every suspect.

Director General of Police B K Singh had yesterday said the four were suspected to be terrorists.

The four suspects said they had left their passports in a vehicle which they said was parked at a distance and left the hotel reception to retrieve their passports.

“On suspicion, a vehicle with a Delhi registration number has been intercepted in Visakhapatnam district”.

The hotel authorities suspected their attitude to be different from a normal visitor and had informed the police.

Noting that all the five have been detained and not arrested, Bothra said an STF team will go to Visakhapatnam tomorrow to ascertain the goal of their visit to Odisha and why they fled from the hotel when identity proof was sought.

Sources said the face of one of the four foreigners had been captured in the CCTV installed inside the hotel.

Odisha Police is now screening the CCTV camera images available with the hotel. “We have beefed up the security of the city and of our Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik as well”. We don’t have more details at this point of time.

The police have also appealed to the public to inform them if they come across any suspected persons. The hotel is located 300 metres away from Mahatma Gandhi Marg, where the State-level Republic Day parade was held on Tuesday. “We had tightened security since last night after disappearance of the four suspected persons”, Sharma said.