POSSIBLE CHEMICAL ATTACK against US base in Spain averted:

An al Qaeda cell based in France planned a chemical attack on a U.S. naval base in Rota, Spain, newspaper ABC reported on Tuesday.

Algerian Said Arif, extradited to France from Syria last year, has admitted his cell was plotting a chemical attack on the southern Spanish base controlled by the United States since 1953, the Spanish daily reported.

However, authorities did not know how they were going to carry out the attack, ABC said.

No one at Spain's Interior Ministry was available to comment on the report, which did not cite sources.

Rota is the American military base in Southern Spain where, according to press reports only a couple of days ago, special forces units could be regrouped. I'm sure that'll speed things up.

UPDATE. More here.

UPDATE II. And meanwhile Bono -not U2's Paul Hewson, but José Bono, Spain's Defense minister- is on an official visit to the US, and got along quite well with his counterpart, Rumsfeld, though reading the transcript of the impromptu press conference gives a somewhat less fence-mending thing; more like a "we can't help to get along in counter-terrorist and military affairs in the age of Terror, so just like we deal with Pakistan, we'll deal with you guys".