AP, Washington :
CIA chief John Brennan has told the Senate intelligence committee that his agency found no evidence of a connection between Omar Mateen and the militant Islamic State (IS) group.
Mateen, who killed 49 people when he raided a gay nightclub in Orlando on Sunday, stated allegiance to the militant group minutes before the attack.
Mr Brennan told the lawmakers that four days of investigation by the CIA and other US intelligence agencies concluded that Mateen was a “lone wolf.”
The FBI also has determined that Mateen was not directed by or in contact with IS before the Orlando attack. In Facebook posts from inside the club and a 911 call during the attack, Mateen reportedly declared his allegiance to the group. But investigators are now focusing more on his apparently complicated relationship with his sexuality.
The CIA chief, however, said that recent terrorist attacks in Paris and Brussels, were “directed” by IS leadership in Syria and Iraq.
Mr Brennan acknowledged that the group’s “terrorist capacity or global reach” remained undiminished by US-led advances on IS-held cities like Manbij and Fallujah. He warned that IS could accelerate terrorist attacks worldwide, a reversion to its pre-2014 status quo.
Mr Brennan warned IS could rely on as many as 38,000 adherents, mostly combatants, across Iraq, Syria, Libya, Sinai, Nigeria, Yemen, Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Also on Thursday, the US House of Representatives voted down an amendment that would bar the security services from accessing communications of US citizens without warrants and compelling communications firms to weaken encryption. The amendment was defeated by a 222-198 vote.
Orlando: FBI agents on Friday questioned a member of the Florida mosque attended by Omar Mateen, the man who shot 49 people to death at a gay nightclub, as new information surfaced revealing the killer had exhibited chronic behavioral problems during his youth.
Academic records obtained by Reuters showing Mateen was frequently suspended as a student – at least twice for fighting before he was transferred to a special high school for potential dropouts – added to a disturbing portrait of the long-troubled gunman who committed the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history.
Mateen, the 29-year-old private security guard shot dead by police at the end of the June 12 massacre in Orlando, has been described by his first wife (whom he divorced after a brief marriage) as an abusive, mentally disturbed man with a violent temper.
Others who knew him recalled Mateen, a US citizen and Florida resident born in New York to Afghan immigrants, as a quiet, socially awkward individual who kept largely to himself.
The FBI has acknowledged interviewing Mateen in 2013 and 2014 for suspected ties to ISIS terrorist groups but concluded he posed no threat. Still, evidence in the Orlando case points to a crime at least inspired by extremist ideology.
Authorities have said Mateen paused a number of times during his three-hour siege at the Pulse nightclub to place cell phone calls to emergency 911 dispatchers and to post internet messages professing support for various Islamist militant groups.
Nevertheless, Mateen appears to have been “self-radicalized” and acting without any direction from outside networks, although his second wife, Noor Salman, had known of his plans to carry out the attack, US officials have said.
A federal grand jury was convened earlier in the week to decide whether to charge Salman.
CIA chief John Brennan has told the Senate intelligence committee that his agency found no evidence of a connection between Omar Mateen and the militant Islamic State (IS) group.
Mateen, who killed 49 people when he raided a gay nightclub in Orlando on Sunday, stated allegiance to the militant group minutes before the attack.
Mr Brennan told the lawmakers that four days of investigation by the CIA and other US intelligence agencies concluded that Mateen was a “lone wolf.”
The FBI also has determined that Mateen was not directed by or in contact with IS before the Orlando attack. In Facebook posts from inside the club and a 911 call during the attack, Mateen reportedly declared his allegiance to the group. But investigators are now focusing more on his apparently complicated relationship with his sexuality.
The CIA chief, however, said that recent terrorist attacks in Paris and Brussels, were “directed” by IS leadership in Syria and Iraq.
Mr Brennan acknowledged that the group’s “terrorist capacity or global reach” remained undiminished by US-led advances on IS-held cities like Manbij and Fallujah. He warned that IS could accelerate terrorist attacks worldwide, a reversion to its pre-2014 status quo.
Mr Brennan warned IS could rely on as many as 38,000 adherents, mostly combatants, across Iraq, Syria, Libya, Sinai, Nigeria, Yemen, Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Also on Thursday, the US House of Representatives voted down an amendment that would bar the security services from accessing communications of US citizens without warrants and compelling communications firms to weaken encryption. The amendment was defeated by a 222-198 vote.
Orlando: FBI agents on Friday questioned a member of the Florida mosque attended by Omar Mateen, the man who shot 49 people to death at a gay nightclub, as new information surfaced revealing the killer had exhibited chronic behavioral problems during his youth.
Academic records obtained by Reuters showing Mateen was frequently suspended as a student – at least twice for fighting before he was transferred to a special high school for potential dropouts – added to a disturbing portrait of the long-troubled gunman who committed the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history.
Mateen, the 29-year-old private security guard shot dead by police at the end of the June 12 massacre in Orlando, has been described by his first wife (whom he divorced after a brief marriage) as an abusive, mentally disturbed man with a violent temper.
Others who knew him recalled Mateen, a US citizen and Florida resident born in New York to Afghan immigrants, as a quiet, socially awkward individual who kept largely to himself.
The FBI has acknowledged interviewing Mateen in 2013 and 2014 for suspected ties to ISIS terrorist groups but concluded he posed no threat. Still, evidence in the Orlando case points to a crime at least inspired by extremist ideology.
Authorities have said Mateen paused a number of times during his three-hour siege at the Pulse nightclub to place cell phone calls to emergency 911 dispatchers and to post internet messages professing support for various Islamist militant groups.
Nevertheless, Mateen appears to have been “self-radicalized” and acting without any direction from outside networks, although his second wife, Noor Salman, had known of his plans to carry out the attack, US officials have said.
A federal grand jury was convened earlier in the week to decide whether to charge Salman.
