US News

Ft. Hood link in ‘crotch’ case

Bumbling knicker-bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab undoubtedly met up with vitriol-spewing Fort Hood-linked imam Anwar al-Awlaki in the days before his harrowing Christmas Day bid to bring down an airliner with explosives-packed underwear, Yemeni authorities said yesterday.

Under the guise of being a student of Islamic law, Abdulmutallab traveled to an al Qaeda stronghold in Yemen’s lawless Shabwa province and stayed in a home used by Awlaki, the US-raised radical imam who counseled Fort Hood Massacre gunman Nidal Malik Hasan, as well as two 9/11 hijackers.

“If he went to Shabwa, for sure he would have met Anwar al-Awlaki,” said Rashad Mohammed al-Alimi, Yemen’s deputy prime minister for defense, The Washington Post reported.

During the visit with al-Aulaqi, Abdulmutallab — the troubled 23-year-old son of a wealthy Nigerian banker — was fitted with his underwear bomb and taught how to detonate it with an acid-filled syringe, Yemen authorities believe.

US authorities think Awlaki has gone beyond his old role of propagandist to actually planning attacks.

Mercifully, the undie bomb failed to explode aboard Detroit-bound Northwest Flight 253, which was packed with nearly 300 travelers.

Yemeni authorities believe that Abdulmutallab remained in Yemen until Dec. 7.

His journey to the United States began in Ghana on Dec. 24, when he flew to Nigeria and spent less than 30 minutes at the Lagos airport before rushing to a KLM flight to Amsterdam, said Nigerian Information Minister Dora Akunyili.

From the Dutch capital, Abdulmutallab boarded his Detroit-bound flight.

Abdulmutallab went through normal security screenings at both the Lagos and Amsterdam airports, according to officials in both countries.

Authorities are focusing on Abdulmutallab’s movements in Yemen, home to 200 to 300 al Qaeda fighters, who are spreading their toxic hatreds to terrorists-in-training.

Yemeni authorities said they were never informed Abdulmutallab was a potential terrorist.

“If we had received the information at the appropriate time, our security apparatus could have taken obvious measures to stop him,” Alimi said.

American officials never connected the dots after Abdulmutallab’s father told US Embassy personnel in Nigeria that his son may have linked up with terrorists in Yemen.

Just as jarring, it now appears that Awlaki survived a Dec. 24 airstrike on his lair that US authorities thought had killed him.

Yemeni journalist Abdulelah Hider Shaea told ABC News that he spoke to Awlaki after the attack. “I’m alive!” Shaea quoted him as saying.

“He said the house that was attacked was two or three kilometers away from him and he was not there,” Shaea said.

It may be the second time Awlaki escaped US justice. He was investigated after 9/11, but fled the country in late 2002 before authorities had the evidence to arrest him.

chuck.bennett@nypost.com