British police have revealed that the wife of a suicide bomber who targeted Christmas shoppers in Sweden last year has been arrested on suspicion of making preparations for a terrorist attack.
Police confirmed Wednesday that 28-year-old Mona Thwany was taken into custody on Tuesday. London police said officers detained the woman at her home in Luton — a small city close to London — and also searched two properties. Police released Thwany on bail until November.
Her husband, Taimour Abdulwahab, injured two people last December in Stockholm when explosives he was carrying exploded. Prosecutor Tomas Lindstrand said it appeared that the bombs Abdulwahab was carrying detonated prematurely by mistake, killing him. Minutes earlier, a bomb in a car registered in Abdulwahab's name and parked near a shopping street exploded. No one except Abdulwahab died in the blasts.
Lindstrand said Abdulwahab had bombs strapped to his body and additional explosives in a backpack, and had sent threats referring to “jihad” in an email shortly before his death. The e-mails referred to Sweden's military presence in Afghanistan and Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks, whose 2007 drawing of the Prophet Muhammad as a dog angered Muslims around the world.
While in Britain, Abdulwahab worshipped at the Luton Islamic Center. Mosque secretary Farasat Latif said Abdulwahab left in 2007 after mosque officials confronted him for his extremist views. He was born in the Middle East and became a Swedish citizen in 1992 before living in Britain for several years.