(Scanpix/AP Photo/APTN)

Kurdish forces arrested Wednesday three suspected members of the radical Islamic group Ansar al-Islam carrying suitcases packed with explosives outside a major oil company and a crowded market, a senior police official in Kirkuk said.

Still active

- Ansar al-Islam is divided. A number of the members of the organisation, who were active while Mullah Krekar was the leader, have given up and gone home. However, a small group has seized control and is still active, Mullah Krekar’s brother Khalid Faraj Ahmad tells TV 2 Nettavisen.

He emphasizes that he has no knowledge of the persons responsible for the recent car bombings in Iraq.

- Ansar responsible

A source within the old Ansar al-Islam group in Northern Iraq confirms that Ansar itself staged the UN bombing.

- The new leaders of Ansar al-Islam are responsible for the bombing of the UN headquarters. They are allegedly also responsible for another car bomb in Northern Iraq, the spokesperson tells TV 2 Nettavisen.

The source was active in the organisation until the war broke out. He says he quit because he was not willing to use suicide bombings and car bombs directed at his own people.

He still claims that he has “reliable information” that the new leaders of the organisation were the masterminds behind the UN bombing.

24 killed

24 people were killed when a car bomb went off outside the UN headquarters in Baghdad August 19. The U.S. government has long suspected Ansar al-Islam to be the organisation responsible for the terrorist act.

The Ansar spokesman says a number of car bombs and suicide attacks directed at U.S. interests in Iraq have been planned.