'I never knew my husband had become a terrorist': Wife of British-based suicide bomber tells of her 'devastation' over Stockholm attack



Suspect was expelled from Luton mosque for trying to recruit extremists



Swedish authorities claim he detonated pipe bomb in shopping centre



Bomber visited radical 'Judgement Day' websites



Wife talks of her 'shock' at the terrorist plot claiming she was in the dark



The wife of suicide bomber who was radicalised in Britain before carrying out a suicide bombing on a busy street in Sweden today spoke of her 'devastation'.



Iraqi-born Taimour Abdulwahab Al-Abdaly, 28, blew up his car, then himself, in the capital Stockholm.

And today it emerged he was thrown out of a Luton mosque three years ago for being too radical.

A Swedish prosecutor said it was likely that Abdulwahab was wearing a bomb belt and was possibly on his way to a department store or train station when the explosive detonated by accident.



Abdulwahab spent much of the last decade in Luton – long known as a hotbed of terrorism – where he studied for a degree and continued living there with his wife Mona Thwany and three young children.

Terror: A firefighter with a foam hose battles with the car after it was set ablaze by the bomber

Mrs Thwany - who runs her own beauty business Amira Make-up and Hair - said she had no clue about her husband's intentions.

Asked if she had been aware of the plot she told Swedish newspaper Expressen: 'No, of course not. I really don’t want to talk right now. I am very devastated and upset.'



Sources at the Luton Islamic Centre today said Abdulwahab's views were deemed so extreme that he was asked to leave after he began giving sermons three years ago.

It is claimed after being kicked out of the mosque he began preaching to the Islamic Society at the University of Bedfordshire.

Qadeer Baksh, chairman of the Luton Islamic Centre, said he tried to reason with al-Abdaly but to no avail.

'It was the general public, worshippers, that brought it to the committee's attention that there was someone in here teaching something that is alien to Islam - extremist views,' he said.



'So I went and I faced him. I challenged his thoughts and his ideas and we got into a theological debate.

'I felt he was playing a game with me, just so he gets access to these worshippers. So, basically, I confronted him in front of the whole community and I brought up every single one of the doubts that he had been spreading and that he was debating with me.'



Police were searching a property in the town today as part of the probe into the suicide attack.

The Bedfordshire town has a Muslim population of 20,000 and has been linked with a string of high-profile extremists.



Last year Muslim protesters disrupted a homecoming march of soldiers returning from Afghanistan.

It has also emerged Abdulwahab - who had lived in the UK for 10 years - visited radical Islamic websites and Facebook groups including one which offers advice on preparing for Judgement Day.

Another website he visited - Yawm Al-Qiyaamah - shows pictures of Tower Bridge engulfed by flames and has more than 8,000 followers.



His Facebook page features an Islamic flag being raised over a world in flames. On the page, he says he is a member of the group Islamic Caliphate State, which seeks to establish Islamic rule worldwide and adds: ‘I’m a Muslim and I’m proud.'

Police were investigating Abdulwahab’s British connections last night. Neighbours in Luton suggested that his wife, who herself has fundamentalist views, and their children are still living there.

Metropolitan Police officers started examining a house last night, after a warrant was issued under the Terrorism Act 2000.

A terraced property in the Bedfordshire town was cordoned off today, with officers seen going in and out.

Neighbour Noreen Hussain, 30, said the person who lived at the house at the centre of police activity was a family man.

Although she did not know him by name, she said: 'We just said hello every so often. He had two girls and one boy, and the boy was born this year.

'He loved his kids so much. He used to play with them all the time in the garden on the trampoline.'

The involvement of a student from a British university in yet another terrorist incident will raise fresh questions about admissions to UK universities, and the radicalisation of Muslim students when studying in this country.

An apocalyptic image from Abdulwahab's Facebook page which calls for an Islamic state

Police guard: An officer stands outside suspected bomber Taimour Abdulwahab Al-Abdaly's house in Luton

It is less than a year ago that a worldwide alert was sparked when former University College London student Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, a Nigerian, was arrested on suspicion of trying to blow up an aeroplane with explosives hidden in his underpants.

The latest bomber moved to Sweden with his family from Iraq when he was 11. He came to Britain in 2001 to study sports therapy at the University of Luton, now the University of Bedfordshire.



He moved back to Sweden more recently and is believed to have separated from his wife, but they have not divorced.

British education: He is believed to have lived in Luton for a number of years after attending university in the UK

Aftermath: The body of a suicide bomber - thought to be Taimour Abdulwahab Al-Abdaly - lies in a Stockholm city centre street covered with a blanket following two blasts yesterday afternoon

Terror came to usually peaceful Stockholm on Saturday afternoon, minutes after Abdulwahab – who was due to celebrate his 29th birthday today – sent a warning of an impending attack to a Swedish news agency and police.

The mosque in Luton, where the suspect preached, threw him out three years ago for being too radical



The warning referred to the presence of 500 Swedish troops among the Allies in Afghanistan and caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed drawn three years ago by Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks.



The warning email contained messages to the bomber’s family, one asking that his children were told ‘Daddy loves them’



Immediately after the email arrived, Abdulwahab’s car burst into flames on a busy street in the city centre, with a series of explosions following from gas canisters stashed inside the vehicle.

Around ten minutes later Abdulwahab shouted in Arabic before detonating a pipe bomb which killed him and wounded two passers-by.



Tragedy was only narrowly avoided, as police are understood to have found five more bombs on Abdulwahab’s corpse which did not go off. He also wore a rucksack full of nails.



It was speculated that the car bomb was designed to attract police and crowds, who would have been killed in their scores if all the suicide bombs had gone off.



At a taxi office opposite the Luton flat where Abdulwahab is understood to have lived with his wife, employee Imran Khan, 31, said: ‘We used to see him all the time. He lived across the road with his wife, a chubby lady who wore a full veil that covered everything apart from her eyes.

‘He was really quiet and she wouldn’t say anything. I haven’t seen him here for a while but she’s still around with their two little kids.’

Ablaze: A firefighter attempts to put out the fire following a car bomb explosion in Stockholm

Firemen pour in foam to douse the flames of the burning car in Stockholm

The woman believed to be Abdulwahab’s wife two years ago signed an online petition calling for the wearing of the veil to remain legal worldwide.

More than 250 people have joined a group set up on Facebook titled 'RIP Taimour Abdulwahab our brother and friend'.



THE BOMBER'S CHILLING LETTER

The following is the full text of an email sent to a Swedish news agency before the blasts:

'In the name of God the merciful. Prayers and peace to the Prophet Mohammad, peace be upon him.

'Thanks to Lars Vilks and his paintings of the Prophet Mohammad, peace be upon him, and your soldiers in Afghanistan and your silence on all this so shall your children, daughters, brothers and sisters die in the same way as our brothers and sisters and children die.

'Now the Islamic states have fulfilled what they promised you. We are here in Europe and in Sweden, we are a reality, not an invention, I will not say more about this.

'Our actions will speak for themselves, as long as you do not end your war against Islam and humiliation of the prophet and your stupid support for the pig Vilks.

'To all Muslims in Sweden I say: stop fawning and humiliating yourselves for a life of humiliation is far from Islam. Help your brothers and sisters and do not fear anything or anyone, only the God you worship.

'To my family, try to forgive me. I could not sit and watch while all the injustice happens against Islam and the Prophet Mohammad, peace be upon him, when the pig Vilks did what he did.

'Forgive me for my lies. I never went to the Middle East to work or earn money, I went there for jihad. I hope that you can understand me some time. I could never have told you all this or to anyone.'

Scotland Yard said: 'At 10.55pm last night, Metropolitan Police officers executed a search warrant under the Terrorism Act 2000 at an address in Bedfordshire.

'No arrests have been made and no hazardous materials found.'



Al-Abdaly listed himself on Muslim dating website Muslima as a physical therapy graduate from Bedfordshire University.

He wrote on Muslima that he was born in Baghdad and moved to Sweden in 1992 before coming to the UK in 2001.

He said he was married in 2004 and had two young girls.

'I want to get married again, and would like to have a big family. My wife agreed to this,' he wrote.

He said he was looking for a practising Sunni Muslim who loves children and 'wants to please Allah before me'.

He described himself as economically 'OK' and said that when he had extra money he gave it to the needy.

'In the future, am looking for to move to an Arabic country and settle down there...' al-Abdaly added.

An audio file sent to Swedish news agency TT shortly before the blast referred to jihad, saying: 'Now the Islamic state has been created. We now exist here in Europe and in Sweden. We are a reality. I don't want to say more about this. Our actions will speak for themselves.'



Sweden has a military presence in Afghanistan and a Swedish cartoon that depicted the Prophet Mohammed as a dog enraged the Muslim world.

The country had never experienced a suicide bombing and has not had a terrorist attack since the 1970s.



Prime minister Fredrik Reinfeldt said the attack was 'unacceptable'.

He said: 'Sweden is an open society... which has stated a wish that people should be able to have different backgrounds, believe in different gods... and live side by side in our open society.'

The suspected suicide car bomber lies under a blanket while a police forensic officer removes debris from around the body

Hunting for clues: A police forensics officer takes a mobile phone picture of what appears to be an identity card at the scene of the bomber's body

Sealed off: The scene where two separate bomb explosions hit the centre of Stockholm