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UK cops hunt bomb plotters
02/07/2007 08:02 - (SA)
Glasgow - British police were hunting on Monday for accomplices of suspected militants who rammed a burning jeep into a Scottish airport and tried to detonate two car bombs in central London.
A police source said a manhunt was under way for an
unspecified number of suspects after five people were arrested
at the weekend. All five detained were thought to be foreigners,
the source said.
Britain's top-selling Sun newspaper identified one of those
detained as an Iranian doctor who worked at North Staffordshire
Hospital in central England. A spokesperson at the hospital
declined to comment on the case and police would not identify
those detained.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, facing a difficult test
in his first few days in office, said those behind the botched
attacks were associated with al-Qaeda.
Britain's security has been raised to its highest level,
"critical", meaning an attack is believed to be imminent.
"We are dealing with a long-term threat," Brown said on
Sunday. He said the attacks could not be justified as opposition
to Britain's foreign policy.
"Irrespective of Iraq, irrespective of Afghanistan, we have
an international organisation trying to inflict the maximum
damage on civilian life in pursuit of a terrorist cause that is
totally unacceptable to most people."
US President George W Bush praised Brown for a "very
strong response" to the attacks.
"It just goes to show the war against these extremists goes
on," Bush told reporters at his family's home in Kennebunkport,
Maine.
Brown last week replaced Tony Blair, whose 10 years in
office were marked by an aggressive stance on security and a
foreign policy which strongly supported the United States in
Afghanistan and Iraq.
Tightening security
Peter Clarke, the head of London's anti-terrorism police,
said authorities were making swift progress in uncovering the
suspected terrorist network behind the threats.
"The investigation into these attacks is extremely
fast-moving. It is no exaggeration at all to say that new
information is coming to light hour by hour," Clarke said.
The plots raised the spectre of attacks on London transport
two years ago that killed 52 commuters.
Authorities ramped up security measures at airports and
extra police officers patrolled rail stations and increased
checks ahead of the Monday morning rush-hour.
"The main thing we are doing is asking passengers to
continue to be vigilant and go about their business," said a
spokesperson for Britain's transport police.
On Saturday, police arrested the passenger and badly-burned
driver of a Jeep Cherokee who ploughed their vehicle into the
entrance of Glasgow's airport and set it alight in a huge
fireball.
The attack came 36 hours after police found two Mercedes car
bombs packed with fuel canisters, propane tanks and nails parked
near a crowded nightclub in London's teeming theatre district.
Police say the London and Scotland incidents are linked. On
Sunday they raided a house in an affluent suburb about 10
minutes from the Glasgow airport, where neighbours said two
Asian men had moved in just weeks ago.
The other arrests included a 26-year-old man and a
27-year-old woman seized on a major highway in northern England
on Saturday, and a 26-year-old man in Liverpool on Sunday.
- Reuters
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