DETROIT — A Saudi man was arrested at Detroit Metropolitan Airport after federal agents said he lied about why he was traveling with a pressure cooker, but his nephew said Monday that it was all a misunderstanding about a device he simply wanted for cooking.
Two pressure cookers were used in last month’s Boston Marathon bombings.
Hussain Al Khawahir was being held in Detroit on allegations of lying to Customs and Border Protection agents and of using a passport with a missing page. He was arrested Saturday.
His nephew, Nasser Almarzooq, told The Associated Press that he had asked his uncle to bring him the pressure cooker so he could make lamb. The college student said two pressure cookers he bought in the U.S. were “not good at all,” and said the ones available in Saudi Arabia are higher quality.
“I’m Arabic,” said Almarzooq, who is studying mechanical engineering at the University of Toledo in Ohio, about 55 miles south of Detroit. “I always use pressure cookers to cook.”
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Almarzooq said his uncle was coming to visit him for a couple weeks.
On Monday, Almarzooq said he was concerned about his uncle and hadn’t been told anything since his uncle was arrested Saturday. He also vehemently denied any wrongdoing.
“If I wanted to do something stupid like this, should I just take my uncle from Saudi Arabia to buy me a pressure cooker?” he said. “It’s legal here.”
Read more in Tuesday’s Arizona Daily Star and at azstarnet.com
