Nigerian indicted over 'jet bomb plot'

The six charges against Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab include attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction and attempted murder.

Authorities say 23-year-old Abdulmutallab was travelling to Detroit from Amsterdam when he tried to ignite an explosive aboard the airliner.

Passengers pounced on him and prevented a disaster.

He is being held at a federal prison in Milan, Michigan.

US President Barack Obama has blamed a deep failure of national intelligence for the botched terror attack over Detroit, saying the government had enough information but could not "connect those dots".

Speaking after a blunt meeting with his security team, the US President said there had been even more "red flags" than had already been acknowledged – that an al-Qaida affiliate in the Arabian Peninsula planned to strike the US and that it was working with the man accused of trying to blow up the plane with nearly 300 passengers and crew aboard.

"The information was there," Mr Obama said, blasting agencies and analysts for not working out the threat, but without singling out individuals.

"I will accept that intelligence, by its nature, is imperfect," he said. "But it is increasingly clear that intelligence was not fully analysed or fully leveraged. That's not acceptable and I will not tolerate it."

Mr Obama never said who, if anyone, in the government might be held accountable and the White House would not say whether any officials would be sacked. The President's own analysis centred on identifying security gaps and filling them and in the course of that, he would determine whether anyone would lose their job, said one senior administration official familiar with Mr Obama's thinking.

The White House released a statement later, quoting Mr Obama as telling security aides: "This was a screw-up that could have been disastrous.

"We dodged a bullet but just barely.

"It was averted by brave individuals, not because the system worked, and that is not acceptable."

Mr Obama announced no new steps to improve the intelligence or security systems, but promised they would be coming, signalling more changes for air travellers and in the sharing of intelligence.

He made a point of recounting every step his administration had taken since the December 25 incident.

Since the attack, the government has added dozens of names to its lists of suspected terrorists and those barred from flights bound for the US. People on the watch list are subject to additional scrutiny before they are allowed to enter the country, while anyone on the no-fly list is barred from boarding aircraft in or headed for the US.

The Transportation Security Administration directed airlines to give full-body, pat-down searches to US-bound travellers from Yemen,

Nigeria, Saudi Arabia and 11 other countries. One of those countries, Cuba, summoned the top US diplomat on the island on Tuesday to protest against the extra screening for Cuban citizens, calling the new step "this hostile action".

Abdulmutallab has told US investigators he received training and instructions from al-Qaida operatives in Yemen. His father warned the US embassy in Nigeria that his son had drifted into extremism in the al-Qaida hotbed of Yemen, but that threat was never fully digested by the US security apparatus.

"When a suspected terrorist is able to board a plane with explosives on Christmas Day, the system has failed in a potentially disastrous way," Mr Obama said.

"And it's my responsibility to find out why, and to correct that failure."