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WASHINGTON (AP) - The FBI halted the popular public tours of its headquarters building Friday for an indefinite period in response to an unconfirmed, nonspecific threat against bureau facilities in this city, a spokesman said.

NBC News reported that the threat concerned possible terrorist attacks by followers of Osama bin Laden, the wealthy Islamic radical who is charged in this country with masterminding last August's bombings of U.S. Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania that killed 224 people, including 12 Americans.

Law enforcement officials, requesting anonymity, would say only that ``recent events suggest it's fairly evident Bin Laden's followers would be the prime suspects.''

FBI spokesman Tron Brekke said the tours, now taken annually by 250,000 people, would be suspended ``indefinitely, until we can do a security assessment to ensure the safety of our employees and tourists.''

``There is a threat against FBI facilities in Washington, D.C.,'' Brekke said. But he added the threat is ``nonspecific and uncorroborated,'' that is, no specific target was identified.

``Nevertheless, we have to take it seriously,'' he said.

The threat was not conveyed directly to the government by letter, telephone call or other communication, Brekke said. Rather it was discovered by intelligence means.

The FBI began opening its headquarters to public tours in 1937 when the bureau occupied part of the Justice Department building on Pennsylvania Avenue a few blocks from the White House.

In 1975, the tours moved across the street to the new FBI headquarters in the J. Edgar Hoover Building. The tours are highlighted by agents demonstrating the firing of a submachine gun.

People on the tour also get to see, through glass partitions, the FBI laboratory.

-- flb (fben4077@yahoo.com), July 23, 1999

Answers

We are relying on these people to protect this country, and they cannot protect themselves?

-- A. Hambley (a.hambley@usa.net), July 23, 1999.

With bin Laden all we have to hear is a rumor and we will shut a place down. Thats all he has to do to cripple us, he doesn't have to actually do anything. Just talk about it.

Taz...who says hire a hit man...and make sure the hit man is a Jew !!

-- Taz (Tassie@aol.com), July 24, 1999.

A close relative of mine has been in the FBI HQ on business. His/her main comment afterwards was "not many locks, just 150 men with automatic weapons walking around".

www.y2ksafeminnesota.com

-- MinnesotaSmith (y2ksafeminnesota@hotmail.com), July 24, 1999.

In reality it's because they've run out of storage space in their basement, attic, closets and offices. So now they're going to start stacking buckets of wheat, corn, rice and beans along the hallway walls. And they just can't let the visiting public see that!

I've even heard that FBI Director Freeh's desk is now a 4'x8' sheet of 3/4" plywood supported by buckets of sugar and salt. ;)

WW

-- Wildweasel (vtmldm@epix.net), July 24, 1999.