Terror attack foiled in France?

French authorities in Paris have arrested three men with suspected ties to the al-Qaida terrorist network who were allegedly plotting a chemical or biological attack.

"This is not a small affair," French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy told the National Assembly. "This is serious. When one finds people who have this material, we do well to arrest them."

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Quoting unidentified police sources, French radio and television reports and the daily newspaper Le Parisien said the group was planning a chemical attack.

UPI reported that French police seized empty containers, vials of suspicious fluids, powders and a chemical suit, along with $5,000 in cash and phony identification papers in the Paris suburb of Seine-Saint-Denis.

Specialists are currently studying the materials, but if tests confirm the substances could be used to stage chemical or biological attacks, it would substantiate European concerns that new terrorist assaults are likely to be more deadly, UPI reported.

British officials also recently announced foiling an attempted bio-attack aimed at London's underground.

French reports said all three men were suspected al-Qaida members that had spent time in Afghanistan and the breakaway Russian republic of Chechnya. The men are of Algerian or Moroccan descent, Sarkozy said.

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A woman was also arrested later Tuesday. She has been identified as the wife of one of the other suspects.

All four were taken into custody for "criminal association in connection with a terrorist enterprise" under an investigation begun last month into the activities of groups from Chechnya, the daily Le Figaro reported.

The men had been under surveillance by French authorities for months. Mirouane Ben Ahmed, the leader of the group, is believed to be tied to Frankfurt, Germany-based Islamist radicals who have been charged with plotting a terrorist attack on the French city of Strasbourg two years ago.

The group also is suspected of having ties to Islamist leader Abou Doha, who is currently in jail in Britain.