Obama plane attack to Al- Qaeda

US President Barack Obama has, for the first time, publicly linked the suspect who tried to blow up a US-bound passenger plane on Christmas Day to Al- Qaeda.

In his first weekly radio and Internet address of the new year released on the White House website, Obama said it appeared a Yemeni affiliate of al-Qaeda trained the suspect, "equipped him with...explosives, and directed him to attack" the plane "headed for America". Obama said the group had attacked American targets before, including killing an American at the US Embassy in Yemen in 2008. He said the US government is strengthening its partnership with Yemen "to strike al- Qaeda terrorists".