Maldives vice-president arrested over ‘bomb plot’

The vice-president of the Maldives Ahmed Adheeb has been arrested as part of an investigation over an alleged plot to assassinate president Abdulla Yameen, a police official told Reuters.

Mr Yameen was unhurt in an explosion in his presidential boat Finifenmaa while he was returning from Saudi Arabia after the haj pilgrimage.

“We have arrested the vice-president in relation to the Finifenmaa incident,” a police media official told Reuters.

“He is now in police custody in Dhoonidhoo detention centre.”

Home minister Umar Naseer in his twitter feed said the charge against the vice president was “high treason”.

Earlier this month president Yameen fired his defence minister in a defence shake-up following the explosion.

The president’s office, citing the findings of international investigators from the US Federal Bureau of Investigation, Saudi Arabia, Australia and Sri Lanka, said the September 28th explosion was an assassination attempt on the president.

Two military officials were arrested.

Mr Jaleel was appointed defence minister in January following the dismissal of his predecessor, Colonel Mohamed Nazim, who is now serving an 11-year jail term for weapons smuggling and planning an attack on the president.

Mr Yameen (59) was unhurt in the blast as the presidential launch approached the capital Male, but his wife and two aides were injured.

Initially the government said it could be due to mechanical failure.

A broader crackdown against political dissent belies the popular image of the Maldives, an island chain with a population of 400,000, as a holiday paradise. Radicalised youths are enlisting in significant numbers to fight for Islamic State militants in the Middle East.

Reuters