国际英语新闻：NYC "explosive device" not likely to detonate: officials

NEW YORK, Oct. 11 (Xinhua) -- The plastic explosive C4 found on Monday in a historic cemetery on New York City's Lower East Side was not likely to explode without a detonator, officials said.

Nine sticks of the material used by the military and in demolition were discovered while shrubs were being planted in Marble Cemetery, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly told reporters at the scene, on 2nd Street, between First and Second avenues, in a generally residential neighborhood of the East Village in the lower east side of Manhattan, New York City.

There was no indication the material was intended for a terrorist attack. Officials said it was not likely to explode without a detonator.

However, scrawled on a nearby sidewalk in what appeared to be chalk was, "I really hope one of you find this," Kelly said, adding it was not immediately determined if it was related to the material found which he said appeared to have been there for a long time.

Additionally, at a police precinct stationhouse about three blocks away a "rambling" note referring to Christ and 2nd Street was found on a police car "supposedly signed by Jesus Christ," he said. But, "It had no specificity. At this time it doesn't appear to have a connection with the explosives that were found."

When the explosives were discovered the police bomb squad and the Fire Department responded to the scene and the area was cordoned off.

The incident occurred just five days after Pakistani-American Faisal Shahzad was sentenced in federal court Manhattan to life in prison for igniting an explosive device May 1 in Times Square which fizzled and failed to detonate but frazzled the nerves of New Yorkers with memories of the Sept. 11, 2001 attack on the twin towers of the World Trade Center.

The commissioner said the amount of C4 was the same as that used in the four London Underground and double-deck bus bombings in 2005 which killed 52 people.

New York City Marble Cemetery was established in the early 1800s and was the first non-sectarian cemetery in New York.