Iraq busts Al-Qaida cell suspected of plotting chemical attacks

Iraq's Defense Ministry said on Saturday that it has busted an Al-Qaida cell that allegedly had worked to produce poisonous gas to stage chemical attacks home and abroad.

The Iraqi military intelligence arrested the cell's five members after monitoring them for three months, Defense Ministry spokesman Mohammed al-Askari told a press conference.

The group built two facilities in Baghdad and a third one in an undisclosed province to produce sarin and mustard gas for making chemical weapons, Askari said.

According to their confessions, the five people had plotted to use chemical agents inside Iraq, and they also had a network to transport them into neighboring countries, Europe and North America, he said.

The Al-Qaida front in Iraq is responsible for most of the massive attacks in the country, raising fears that the terrorist group and other militias could return to stage widespread violence.