Blair expects terror attack
2003-01-21 15:28
London - Prime Minister Tony Blair said on Tuesday he expected terror groups like al-Qaeda to attempt an attack on Britain.
"I believe it is inevitable that they will try in some form or other," Blair told senior legislators in an evidence session.
"I think we can see evidence from the recent arrests that the terrorist network is here as it is around the rest of Europe, around the rest of the world."
Police searching a London mosque that was raided on Monday in Britain's biggest anti-terror operation since September 11, found tear gas and a stun gun. Seven men were arrested during the raid, which was part of a wider probe into the discovery of the lethal poison ricin.
It was the most dramatic in a series of counter-terrorism swoops in recent months, with the pace quickening after the discovery earlier this month of a small amount of ricin in a flat in north London.
Last November, Blair said he was bombarded almost daily with new intelligence about threats to UK interests.
"At the moment, barely a day goes by without some new piece of intelligence coming via our security services about a threat to UK interests," he said in a speech. "Some of it will be reliable."
Britain has arrested more than 200 terror suspects since the September 11 attacks, with most of those detained said to be north African and mainly Algerian.