Brit cops to quiz suspects

2004-04-01 22:37

London - British anti-terrorist police have won an extra three days to question eight men arrested in raids in London on Tuesday which apparently foiled a plot to build and detonate a powerful bomb.

Police said a judge agreed late on Wednesday to give detectives more time to grill the suspects, aged 17 to 32, all British citizens reportedly of Pakistani descent, under the Terrorism Act 2000.

They were taken into custody on Tuesday when 700 police officers in raids on 24 locations in and around London which also netted a half-ton of ammonium nitrate fertiliser that could be used to make explosives.

"The extensions apply till late afternoon of Saturday," the Metropolitan Police said in a statement. Under the law, the police could apply to keep the suspects for a maximum two weeks.

Police have said there is no connection between the operation and the Madrid train bombings on March 11 which killed 191 and renewed fears of a terrorist attack, possibly by al-Qaeda, on the British capital.

But Spain's outgoing Interior Minister Angel Acebes said that one of the suspects might have had a connection with the Madrid bombings.

It was also unclear what link might exist between Tuesday's raids and the arrest in Canada of a 24-year-old computer technician charged in connection with unspecified terrorist-related activity in Ottawa and London.

Mohammad Momin Khawaja, a Canadian citizen of Pakistani origin, appeared in court in the Canadian capital on Wednesday after he was taken into custody on Monday.

Police arrested the eight suspects in raids on homes and businesses in London and the surrounding counties. Some of the sites were in the vicinity of Heathrow, Gatwick and Luton airports.

Their names have not been disclosed by police, but at least three are related to each other, according to family members.

The confiscated ammonium nitrate fertiliser represented the biggest seizure of potential bomb-making material in the United Kingdom since the Irish Republican Army (IRA) suspended its armed campaign against British rule of Northern Ireland in 1997.

Experts say the easy-to-buy fertiliser, discovered at a 24-hour self-service warehouse in west London, could have made a devastating bomb if combined with a "booster" such as Semtex, a plastic explosive.

Prime Minister Tony Blair took pains to reiterate that Britain's more than 1.7 million Muslims were not being singled out in the fight against terrorism.

- AFP