Clashes in wake of Saudi election claim 4

MECCA, Saudi Arabia — Islamic militants clashed with Saudi security forces in Islam's holiest city of Mecca and nearby Jiddah, killing two militants and two policemen yesterday as the kingdom held a final round of municipal elections.

The bloodshed was the latest in Saudi Arabia's two-year crackdown on al-Qaida-linked militants opposed to the ruling family, a campaign that authorities have said they were winning with the killings of several high-level suspects over the past month.

The fighting in Mecca started when four militants in a car — a driver and three others disguised in women's all-covering robes — tried to cross through a checkpoint into the city several hours after polls closed, said Brig. Gen. Mansour al-Turki, an Interior Ministry spokesman.

When stopped, the militants tried to flee. Police captured the driver, but the three others fled and took shelter in nearby houses, al-Turki told the state-run television station Al-Ekhbariya.

After several hours of fighting, two of the militants were killed and the third was wounded and captured. Two policemen were killed and a number were wounded, the officials said.

Hours earlier, security forces fought a pair of militants in Jiddah, about 40 miles from Mecca, officials in the port city said. Security was tight in both cities as men in western Saudi Arabia were going to the polls yesterday in the last of three round of elections for municipal councils.

Al-Qaida's branch in the kingdom issued no direct threats or condemnations against the election, Saudi Arabia's first limited experiment in democracy. Islamic hard-liners have done well in previous rounds of the election, held in central and eastern Saudi Arabia earlier this year.

Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and 15 of the 19 Sept. 11, 2001, suicide hijackers, has cracked down on al-Qaida and other armed militants since 2003, after a string of deadly suicide bombings.

Its security forces have killed or captured 23 of the militants on the most-wanted list.