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Brits fear Madrid-style attack

2004-03-15 20:48
line

London - Sitting by her jewellery stall at one of London's busiest railway stations, Mary Doyle was convinced Britain's capital would suffer an attack on the scale of last week's bomb blasts in Madrid.

"It's going to happen, no doubt about it. It's not if, it's when," she said at Charing Cross Station.

Around the corner, at the Embankment subway station, Andy Trotter, deputy chief of the British Transport Police, was unveiling a campaign to step up vigilance on the London Underground.

"Those awful events in Madrid underline just how serious this is and how important it is that we work together," Trotter said.

"We are trying to employ the eyes and ears of the three million passengers that use the network," he said.

In the wake of the Madrid atrocities, which saw 200 people killed in bomb blasts on four rush-hour trains last Thursday, police announced that plainclothes anti-terrorist officers would begin to patrol the Underground.

Police said the unprecedented measure was decided before the Madrid blasts - but in any event, commuters welcomed it.

"It is a good thing," said Charlie Stones, 20, as he waited for a delayed subway train on a packed platform at Waterloo station.

Asked what he thought of police plans to "stop and search" passengers as part of the stricter security measures announced by Trotter, Stones said: "They are only doing their job. I wouldn't mind if they stopped me."

Trotter said on Monday that police would need to be diverted from other duties as part of the stepped-up security, but he would not be drawn on how many of his specialised force's 2 200 officers would partake in the new operation.

While plans were underway to use undercover officers, passengers at Waterloo railway station waiting to board a Eurostar train to Paris were concerned by an absence of uniformed police.

"We just saw the first policeman," said Samantha Friar, 30, an hour after she arrived at the station.

"I am hoping today that my bag gets checked and checked and checked, and that everybody's bag gets checked and checked and checked," she said.

Her husband, Scott, thought it unlikely that terrorists would target a Eurostar train or try to carry out an explosion in the Channel Tunnel that links Britain and France.

"I can't see the French being bombed because France wasn't in the Iraq war," he said, whereas Spain and in particular Britain were allies of the United States in the conflict to oust Saddam Hussein.

Spanish officials initially blamed the Basque separatist group ETA for the Madrid bombings, which preceded Spain's general election on Sunday.

Fears abound, however, that the al-Qaeda network was in fact responsible after a video was found over the weekend in which a man speaking Arabic claimed the attacks in the name of the group.

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Larry says... He He, Lesego. You see, Israel operates under a pure democracy. Not this proportional representation crapola in SA that pretends to be democratic. In Israel people vote for their leaders first and it just so happens that the majority choose Netanyahu, who have just formed a coalition government with the nearest opposition. This means that just over 60% of Israeli citizens support Israeli leadership and principles relating to its self-defense and its dealings with Pestinians etc. And this does not include the extreme right wing parties who would be much harsher in dealing with the Pestinian question. So, you know very little. You do not agree that Syria is still technically at war with Israel. Actually you know very little of nothing. Because I have just proven to you that most Israeli's are like Larry. This I know for a fact. Read the article...

 
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