Terror Alerts

[ted_bloody_maul]

Home Office challenged over terror raid reports

The government came under fire last night from the Conservatives and the human rights group Liberty over the way the media is briefed on counter-terrorism operations.

Last week's dawn raids in Birmingham, which resulted in the arrests of nine people, prompted widespread speculation in the press about the possible cause, all claiming to be based on "senior sources" in the police and intelligence services.

This morning two of those arrested were released without charge, and their lawyer, Gareth Peirce, said they had left the police station "without any better understanding of why they were there than when they first arrived seven days ago".

West Midlands police have been granted another 72 hours to question the remaining seven suspects, but no charges have yet been brought.

In a letter to the top civil servant at the Home Office, David Normington, shadow home secretary David Davis questioned the media briefings on the counter-terrorism raids, in particular with respect to "matters of an operation, sensitive or confidential nature".

He also wrote to Ken Jones, president of the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo) noting the "increasing concern relating to the media handling" of last week's arrests.

The letter was made public after Liberty announced it was also writing to the home secretary, John Reid, questioning his department's role in off the record briefings.

"We are gravely concerned by reports that the Home Office may have secretly and speculatively briefed journalists as security operations were underway," said the group's director, Shami Chakrabarti.

"Any such practices risk undermining the work of police and prosecutors and jeopardise both the trust and safety of the public.

"If the same people have offered secret anti-terror briefings whilst proposing the extension of pre-charge detention, this would be party politics at its most dangerous."

In a statement released this morning, West Midlands police confirmed that two men arrested in Birmingham under the Terrorism Act 2000 have been released without charge and seven other men remain in custody.

"The Crown Prosecution Service has been involved in the examination of the evidence throughout this investigation. It is important that the evidential test is applied equally to determine who should face charges and who should not," it said.

"In all such operations people may be released without charge at this stage, while others may remain in custody for further investigation. This is normal and to be expected in large, complex criminal enquiries where a number of arrests have taken place.

"We still have a large amount of evidence seized during the searches to examine and our enquiries continue with those that remain in custody."

http://www.politics.co.uk/news/domestic ... 465287.htm

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

more on abu the heartbreaker

Islamist extremist who barracked Reid arrested on suspicion of inciting terrorism

A high-profile Islamist militant who has caused outrage by calling for the beheading of British Muslim soldiers and allegedly praising the July 7 bombers was arrested in London yesterday on suspicion of inciting terrorism.

Abu Izzadeen shot to prominence last September when he barracked the home secretary, John Reid, at a community meeting in east London. But his arrest is believed to relate to a speech made last year marking the first anniversary of the July 7 attacks in London in which 52 people died and 750 were injured.

According to a video of the Birmingham speech, Mr Izzadeen talks about the suicide video of the ringleader, Mohammed Sidique Khan, in which Khan declared he was a soldier in a war against the west.
Mr Izzadeen allegedly says of the video, which calls for violence against western civilians: "We'll see the answers for our problems." He allegedly adds that unless western foreign policy changes, the jihadist's message for civilians is stark: "If you stop, you [will] be saved, if you don't stop, we are going to kill you, indiscriminately." He also allegedly mocks a video of a man murdered by hostage takers in Iraq.

If he is charged, it will mark an attempt by the UK authorities to make clear where the limits of acceptable and legal free speech lie.

Mr Izzadeen, who was born Trevor Brooks, is said to have been a member of the radical Islamist group al-Ghurabaa, an offshoot of al-Muhajiroun, both of which are banned in the UK.

Scotland Yard said that the 31-year-old convert to Islam had been arrested at 9.30am close to a tube station on Leyton high street. An arrest on a street during the day by counter-terrorism officers is highly unusual - they usually arrest suspects at their homes.

Police said Mr Izzadeen had been arrested "for allegedly encouraging terrorism, as a result of an ongoing inquiry".

By yesterday evening he was still in custody in Paddington Green high security police station in central London.

Mr Izzadeen's ally, Anjem Choudhury, who was a spokesman for al-Muhajiroun before it disbanded, said the arrest was "a continuation of a witch-hunt against Islam and Muslims by the Blair regime and their boot boys".

This week a video surfaced of Mr Izzadeen calling for British Muslim soldiers to be beheaded. The activities of radicals such as Mr Izzadeen have annoyed moderate British Muslims, as has the constant media platform given to them to air views shared by few people.

Inayat Bunglawala, the assistant secretary general of the Muslim Council of Britain, said: "Abu Izzadeen is a character who has made some incendiary remarks in the past. He is someone who the mainstream Muslim community has kept at a distance because of his attempts to create mischief."

"I think there will be some cynicism about the timing of this arrest, coming 24 hours after two men arrested last week were released without charge."

Ahmed Versi, the editor of Muslim News, a newspaper for British Muslims, said: "I'm surprised at the arrest, after such a long time. It's important that there is evidence, if they charge him, of what he said, otherwise the credibility of the police will be tainted once again."

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/terroris ... 14,00.html

 

[wembley8]

More recently, did you see the 'ricin plot' story?

I did. From memory, the jury acquitted most of the accused after lengthy deliberation. they were not aware at that stage that one of the accused had stabbed a policeman to death during the arrest; which seems rather odd behaviour if the arrest was a completely unjustified attack on innocent Muslims, etc.

The murderer was subsequently also convicted of attempting to manufacture ricin.

In this case it seems a number of people were arrested and a couple released after a few days. This is not unusual in large criminal investigations.

I know little about the released man except that he worked in a bookshop which was known for selling hate material. I can see why the police might have thought he was involved in the alleged plot, even if he was not. At the end of the day he has been kept in custody for less than a week and then released; it hardly compares with the ordeal of the Guildford 4 or Maguire 7.

Interesting how memory works...in fact, there never was a 'ricin plot' as far as the court could establish. One person was convicted conspiring "to commit public nuisance by the use of poisons" ont he basis of some notes, but there was never any ricin.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wood_Green_ricin_plot

The Wikipedia entry is interesting in showing how the 'ricin factory' story was whipped up and fed using leaks of incorrect information 9e.g. that ricin had been found).

A policeman was stabbed during the arrest:

"

They were actually searching for another man and did not recognise Bourgass even though Special Branch were looking for him under the name Nadir Habra.

Bourgass stayed for a time at the Finsbury Park mosque

Bourgass, frantic to get away, stabbed to death Detective Constable Stephen Oake but was overpowered and taken into custody.

He continued to proclaim his innocence and claimed at his trial that he had killed DC Oake out of fear. "

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4440953.stm

You seem to take this as indicating that the suspects were guilty. (If one of the suspects had been shot during the arrest, would this indicate the police were guilty?) To me, it highlights the problem of mutual fear and suspicion and shows why so much caution needs to be exercised. If I was an Islamic fundamentalist I would be very dubious of the police and think twice about helping them.

 

[ramonmercado]

Birmingham: the questions remain
Shiv Malik

Published 12 February 2007

In Sparkhill, Shiv Malik finds that scepticism and "agendas" surround the alleged plot to kidnap and behead a Muslim soldier


"Scorpio", a Pakistani 15-year-old from the Sparkhill area of Birmingham, is talking to his friend Ali about recent events. "It's bad," he says. "Now I can't go to people of other nationalities and say, 'I'm Pakistani, I'm the best of nations'." His friend interrupts. "No. But you can't go and join the British army though. Then you'll be fighting on the gora's [white man's] side against Pakistan." The two friends switch to Urdu, arguing over the rights and wrongs of Muslims joining the British army. At the end, Scorpio tells his friend: "Yeah, but who cares if you join?"

It's a good question. Nine arrested suspects are alleged to have cared about Muslims enlisting in the armed forces so much, that they were planning to put a Muslim soldier on "trial", sever his head as punishment and post the video on the internet as a warning to other British Muslims not to forget whose side they were on.

Yet there is doubt and confusion in Sparkhill. According to assistant chief constable David Shaw, from West Midlands police, this is partly the fault of the media: "Members of the community are bewildered by what is being reported," he said at a press conference last Friday. But also, "sources close to Shaw" revealed he felt the inquiry had been "hijacked", and that it was "obvious" there were "various agendas at work here".

On Saturday, around 150 people: elders, men with families, a few teenagers and even fewer women, gathered for a public meeting at the Birmingham Central Mosque, where they would hear well-known radical activists from Birmingham's Muslim community fill in the blanks on what those "various agendas" were.

Local Respect Party councillor Salma Yaqoob claimed that "demonising" Muslims was the government's "weapon of mass distraction" from policies abroad. Whitehall "spin" had now indelibly linked the images of Ken Bigley's murder with Birmingham: this was threatening community cohesion, causing further alienation and making Muslim youths susceptible to radicalisation. But at the same time, Yaqoob reminded those gathered that terrorism and events such as those of 7 July were "not a failure of multiculturalism". As with Northern Ireland, terrorism was a "political issue". Either way, it seemed the government was to blame.

Imran Waheed, lifetime Birmingham resident and lead spokesperson from Britain's largest radical Islamic group, Hizb ut-Tahrir, told the audience that the government was "playing politics with security". Like Yaqoob, Waheed explained that the government's "Machiavellian plotting" had been employed to "distract the people from their foreign policies in Iraq and Afghanistan".

Moazzam Begg, the Guantanamo Bay detainee was the last to speak at the 90-minute meeting. The former owner of the Maktabah al-Ansar bookshop, one of 18 premises to have been raided by the police, told the audience that he was acquainted with one of the alleged suspects. In fact, his friend - whom he wouldn't name - had helped him to draft a statement condemning the kidnapping of Norman Kember in December 2005. He said that he was "convinced" there was no plot, and the actions of the police represented a "fishing trip". When he announced that the sting had been codenamed "Operation Gamble", the audience erupted into laughter; and when he said that metaphorical "heads would roll" once the truth was out, he received an ovation.

The idea that British jihadists would want to behead fellow Muslims appears a particularly shocking new development in homegrown terrorism. But Shiraz Maher, a former recruiter for Hizb ut-Tahrir, who is also a Birmingham resident, explained to me that if the plot is real, then the tactics of kidnapping and beheading should be seen as a sign of the jihadist movement's weakness, rather than its strength. "The Muslim community has traditionally been nonchalant towards extremism or extremist mosques, and the terrorists have always used that to allow them to manoeuvre and operate," said Maher. "Now people are turning their backs on these groups. As a result, they have to target Muslims specifically in order to silence dissent and debate within the community."

A former member of the British jihadi network, who wished not to be named for security reasons, also suggested that the tactic of beheading should be viewed as a sign of weakness, or as he put it, a failure of "creative drive". Over the years, he explained, the British jihadi network was usually made up of people who were more ideological and strategic in their actions. But in the post-7 July environment, where many of those members have been arrested, killed, gone abroad or quit, the network may be having trouble educating high-quality strategists at a fast enough rate. The beheading plot could be a sign that the network is now operating on empty and has been reduced to employing criminals and simple "cold-blooded killers".

Shiraz Maher also said that, by playing politics with the information from the investigation, Whitehall may be doing the work of the terrorists for them. "The point that the alleged plotters may have wanted to make, which was to scare Muslims who are choosing to integrate, has already been made by leaking the details of the plot," he said. "In Muslim communities, that debate about joining the British army and the police is now taking place."

http://www.newstatesman.com/200702120012

 

[Nemo]

It's ok people calm down, when an attack happens we'll all sit down and 'ave a cup of char & a knees up and maybe the Queen (Gawd bless 'er) will visit to boost our moral. Just like her Mam did in the blitz

 

[ramonmercado]

Dirty Bombs Not Such a Blast
By Eli Kintisch
ScienceNOW Daily News
18 February 2007

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA--Radioactive dispersal devices--also known as dirty bombs--might be less harmful to fire fighters or police officers than long feared. That's the conclusion of a new set of explosive experiments described here yesterday at the annual meeting of the American Association of the Advancement of Science (which publishes ScienceNOW).
Dirty bombs have been on the radar for decades, but their threat has taken on increased urgency since 11 September 2001. The idea goes that terrorists unable to secure a nuclear weapon would instead strap an explosive device to a container filled with radioactive material, which would likely be stolen from a medical or industrial facility. Although the damage caused by a dirty bomb would pale in comparison to that caused by a true nuke, experts fear that such bombs could still cause panic and possible injury or death by spreading radioactive material over potentially large areas.

To better gauge the threat, physicist Fred Harper and colleagues at Sandia National Laboratory in Albuquerque, New Mexico, conducted a series of blasts to determine how certain materials behave during an explosion. In one set of tests, Harper and Canadian defense scientists exploded various devices thought to be similar to terrorist bombs a few meters off the ground. Those tests suggested the kinds of fragments that could lead to acute radiological sickness tend to travel less far than feared. Other tests, simulating urban ground environments such as sand, dirt, and concrete, suggested that dirt or grit from the area tended to create larger fragments during the blast, lowering their distance.

That's good news for first responders, such as police and fire fighters. They shouldn't need to wear full radioactive suits or air tanks, Harper says, because the size and type of fragments that would be produced by likely weapons wouldn't warrant that kind of protection, ending up mostly on the ground rather than in the air.

"Until Fred made this data available, people were using assumptions," says Steve Musolino, a health physicist at Brookhaven National Laboratory in Upton, New York.

Still, the new data are agnostic on the long-term risks for cancer for the general public that such devices create. But Musolino says the findings could have implications for the arduous task of cleanup. Even from a small device, that process could take months or years in a city as officials struggle to find radioactive particles that went airborne after the blast. Harpers findings hint, however, that a greater fraction of bomb fragments would stay close to the blast site, making for an easier cleanup effort.

Related site

Fact sheet on dirty bombs
www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/ ... bombs.html


http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/co ... 2007/218/1

 

[ramonmercado]

Tape dispenser causes town alert

A tape dispenser was found outside the police station
Police have yet to establish how a tape dispenser which caused a security alert in Ballymena came to be left on a bollard outside a PSNI station.
The tape dispenser, believed to have the abbreviation SOCO written on it, was found at the station on the Galgorm Road at about 1010 GMT.

The letters SOCO are most commonly associated with the PSNI's former Scenes Of Crimes Officers who have been re-named Crime Scene Investigators.


The Army carried out a controlled explosion on the object which was declared safe.


Traffic in the town was severely disrupted for several hours while the operation took place.

A police spokesperson said: "As with any object that cannot readily be accounted for, we have a duty to be wary in order to ensure the safety of all in the vicinity," they added.

"In this case, the object was outside the perimeter of the station, and away from the entrance - and totally out of place - so we therefore had concerns for the safety of members of the public as well as for police officers and staff.

"We are also conscious that terrorists have used items made up to look like police equipment in booby traps."



http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/nort ... 387857.stm

 

[ramonmercado]

This book sounds interesting, Davis has written some interesting stuff in the past. Esp ''Late Victorian Holocausts: El Niño Famines and the Making of the Third World'' Review LVH by AMARTYA SEN

Terrorist techniques

Wheels within wheels

Feb 15th 2007
From The Economist print edition



Buda's Wagon: A Brief History of the Car Bomb
By Mike Davis



Verso; 192 pages; $22.95 and £12.99

Buy it at
Amazon.com
Amazon.co.uk



THE car bomb, whether guided by a suicidal driver or not, is a common fact of modern life. Its effects have been felt across the world—in Palestine in the 1940s, Algeria and Vietnam in the 1960s, Northern Ireland in the 1970s, Lebanon and Sri Lanka in the 1980s, and America in the 1990s. Since the September 11th 2001 attacks on America (a horribly scaled-up version of the car-bomb technique of using an everyday mode of transport as a weapon) car bombs have become even more commonplace in Iraq and Afghanistan.

EPA


Cars as carnage

Where did it all start? Mike Davis, a left-wing American historian, traces the origins of the car bomb not to Belfast or Beirut, but to New York. On September 16th 1920, he recounts, an Italian anarchist named Mario Buda drove a horse-drawn cart to the corner of Wall Street and Broad Street, close to the offices of JPMorgan. As he disappeared into the crowd, the wagon, which was packed with explosives, blew up, killing 40 people. The blast left a field of shattered masonry, metal shards, glass splinters—and countless green banknotes abandoned by a hapless bank messenger.

This was a seminal moment, in the view of Mr Davis, when “a poor immigrant with some stolen dynamite, a pile of scrap metal and an old horse had managed to bring unprecedented terror to the inner sanctum of American capitalism.”

The story of Buda's device is one of the few interesting anecdotes in an otherwise dull and flawed book. Much of Mr Davis's account of the “poor man's air force” is a catalogue of explosions, with little explanation of their historical or political context. He has an eye for a catching quote or a moving description, but too much of the book reads like a cut-and-paste job. His sermonising about the car bomb being “an inherently fascist weapon” (though not as fascist, he says, as the “mass terror” inflicted on civilians by Western air forces) is irrelevant.

Almost from the start, Mr Davis undermines the case for Buda to be regarded as the great-grandaddy of Hizbullah, the IRA and the many other car bombers of modern history. He says Buda may have been inspired by the horse-cart bomb that came close to killing Napoleon in 1800. So why not start the story in Paris?

Perhaps because the “infernal machine” detonated on the rue Saint-Nicaise does not fit as neatly into Mr Davis's narrative that America is to blame for much of the carnage. He argues, unconvincingly, that many if not most of the exploding cars of the past 80 years are either a reaction to injustices by America (or allies such as Israel) or are carried out with their connivance. In some cases, they are “blowback” from past American actions, such as supporting the Afghan mujahideen against the Soviet Union. “Ironically the classical ‘weapon of the weak’ is also the most popular clandestine instrument of terror employed by strong governments and superpowers,” he claims.

The trouble with writing about car bombs is that the bombers are often anonymous or dead, allowing for various interpretations of events. Mr Davis tends to be conspiratorial and anti-American, though he presents little to support his view. The author, who made his name writing about Los Angeles and the environment, is right in one respect, though: the car bomb has “a brilliant future”.

Buda's Wagon: A Brief History of the Car Bomb.
By Mike Davis.
Verso; 192 pages; $22.95 and £12.99

http://www.economist.com/books/displays ... id=8697373

 

[lupinwick]

And they keep telling us we're going to die. In fact some papers seem to enjoy it.

The terrorist threat facing Britain from home-grown al-Qaeda agents is higher than at any time since the September 11 attacks in 2001, secret intelligence documents reveal.

The number of British-based Islamic terrorists plotting suicide attacks against "soft" targets in this country is far greater than the Security Services had previously believed, the government paperwork discloses. It is thought the plotters could number more than 2,000.

Telegraph

So chances of another successful counter-terrorist raid in the next 3 weeks?

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

I guess you could randomly throw this story at the Conspiracy forum and it would fit about half of the threads here but this particularl article seems to fit nicely in here for the time being.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's '31 plots'

The alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, has admitted his role in them, and 30 other terror plots around the world, in a hearing at Guantanamo Bay, the Pentagon has said. According to partial transcript of the closed-door hearing, released by the US defence department, the suspect confessed to the following attacks or plots.
1. The 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center in New York City that killed six people and injured more than 1,000.

2. The 11 September 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon in Washington using four hijacked commercial airliners. Nearly 3,000 people were killed.

3. A failed "shoe bomber" operation to bring down two US commercial airliners.

4. The October 2002 attack in Kuwait that killed two US soldiers.

5. The nightclub bombing in Bali, Indonesia that killed 202 people.

6. A plan for a "second wave" of attacks on major US landmarks after 9/11 attacks. Alleged targets included the Library Tower in Los Angeles, the Sears Tower in Chicago, the Plaza Bank building in Seattle and the Empire State Building in New York.

7. Plots to attack oil tankers and US naval ships in the Straits of Hormuz, the Straits of Gibraltar and in Singapore.

8. A plan to blow up the Panama Canal.

9. Plans to assassinate former US presidents including Jimmy Carter.

10. A plot to blow up suspension bridges in New York.

11. A plan to destroy the Sears Tower in Chicago by burning fuel trucks beneath or around it.

12. Plans to "destroy" Heathrow Airport, Canary Wharf and Big Ben in London.

13. A planned attack on "many" nightclubs in Thailand targeting US and British citizens.

14. A plot targeting the New York Stock Exchange and other US financial targets after 9/11.

15. A plan to destroy buildings in Elat, Israel, by using planes flying from Saudi Arabia.

16. Plans to destroy US embassies in Indonesia, Australia and Japan.

17. Plots to destroy Israeli embassies in India, Azerbaijan, the Philippines and Australia.

18. Surveying and financing an attack on an Israeli El-Al flight from Bangkok.

19. Sending several "mujahideen" into Israel to survey "strategic targets" with the intention of attacking them.

20. The November 2002 suicide bombing of a hotel in Mombasa, Kenya, frequented by Israelis. At least 14 people were killed.

21. The failed attempt to shoot down an Israeli passenger jet leaving Mombasa airport with a surface-to-air missile on the same day as the hotel bombing.

22. Plans to attack US targets in South Korea, such as US military bases and nightclubs frequented by US soldiers.

23. Providing financial support for a plan to attack US, British and Jewish targets in Turkey.

24. Surveillance of US nuclear power plants in order to attack them.

25. A plot to attack Nato's headquarters in Europe.

26. Planning and surveillance in a 1995 plan (the "Bojinka Operation") to bomb 12 American passenger jets, most on trans-Pacific Ocean routes.

27. The planned assassination attempt against then-US President Bill Clinton during a mid-1990s trip to the Philippines.

28. "Shared responsibility" for a plot to kill Pope John Paul II while he visited the Philippines.

29. Plans to assassinate Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf.

30. An attempt to attack a US oil company in Sumatra, Indonesia, "owned by the Jewish former [US] Secretary of State Henry Kissinger".

31. One item was deleted from the transcript by the US Defense Department. The Associated Press news agency said it was the beheading of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl who was kidnapped in Pakistan in January 2002 while researching Islamist militancy.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/6452789.stm

 

[Novena]

Wow - that guy's been busy...

 

[ginoide]

doesn't this sound fishy to you? either this guy wants to present himself as the hero/martyr of that certain part of islam, or he was tortured so badly he admitted to every single attack that he had heard of.
just my two pennies, anyway

 

[lupinwick]

Always that problem. You'll admit to anything under torture.

 

[chockfullahate]

sounds like a last attempt to provide the american public with a "patsy" and justify the war on terror.

 

[ramonmercado]

I'm suprised he didn't admit to kidnapping Shergar.

 

[Pietro_Mercurios]

I'm suprised he didn't admit to kidnapping Shergar.

Here's an exclusive extract from his confession:

...

Please allow me to introduce myself, Im a man of wealth and taste. I've been around for a long, long year, stole many a man's soul and faith and I was round when Jesus Christ had his moment of doubt and pain. Made damn sure that Pilate washed his hands and sealed his fate.

Pleased to meet you, hope you guess my name. But, what's puzzling you is the nature of my game. I stuck around St. Petersburg, when I saw it was a time for a change, killed the Tzar and his ministers. Anastasia screamed in vain.

I rode a tank, held a general' s rank, when the blitzkrieg raged and the bodies stank.

...

I watched with glee, while your kings and queens fought for ten decades for the gods they made. I shouted out, "Who killed the Kennedys?" When after all, it was me.

Let me please introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste and I laid traps for troubadours, who get killed before they reached Bombay

...

Pleased to meet you. Hope you guessed my name, oh yeah. But, whats confusing you is just the nature of my game. Just as every cop is a criminal and all the sinners saints, as heads is tails, just call me, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

...

Bang to rights, I'd say!

 

[lupinwick]

 

[CarlosTheDJ]

Nice Pietro, nice :lol:

 

[ramonmercado]

PRINT CLOSE

The spying game
Sam Alexandroni

Published 09 April 2007

Observations on security


Some 300 members of the public crowded into a lecture theatre last month to learn how to help the Metropolitan Police combat terrorism. Project Griffin, as it is known, aims to make useful spies of us all.

First step is to identify your terrorist. Watch for tell-tale signs, we were told, including sweating, mumbled prayers, visible anxiety, bulky clothing and perhaps something (a detonator) gripped in one hand. But, slightly contradicting that, keep an open mind, because there is no profile for suicide bombers.

Project Griffin is a partnership scheme between the police and business, and aims to draw members of the public in to counter-terrorism training days run by the Metropolitan Police. Mine, billed as a primer on how to spot and report potential terrorist attacks, was held at Imperial College London.

"Last year was a good year," said Detective Sergeant David Parks, referring to the absence of terrorist attacks in Britain. "But all the indications we are getting tell us that 2007 is going to be a bad year. A bad year for the police and a bad year for the public."

The message was reinforced by the man who was in charge of "tactical decisions" on the day of the 7 July 2005 bombings. Dean Ingledew, chief superintendent of the City of Westminster police, said: "For those of you who think that terrorism is a flash in the pan, let me assure you that it is a current, present and very real threat to all of us as we speak. I have no doubt there will soon be another terrorist outrage. This has to be a way of life for us for the foreseeable future."

Project Griffin signals a new tactic in the fight against terrorism, namely, seeing it as a community issue on which everyone must do his or her bit. Put simply, the police and security services cannot cope alone: they need "extras" to help counter a threat they predict will last more than a hundred years and become more deadly with time.

"This is not something that can be left to MI5 or Special Branch," said Tom Lund-Lack from the Met's Counter-Terrorism Command. "The IRA was a relatively simple problem. It was motivated by two things - politics and nationalism - but it has taken us more than 120 years to reach the endgame. Islamist terrorism is much more complex. These guys are at their dumb stage at the moment. They are going to become much more sophisticated."

Lund-Lack gave a surprisingly detailed presentation, rushing the audience through from the 8th century - the golden age of Islam, with the expansion of the caliphate from Baghdad to Spain - to the present day. "We don't see ourselves as an oppressive body of people, but that's how the IRA saw us and that's how Islamist terrorists see us," he said.

Nor was he optimistic. There is no one to negotiate with in this new war, we were told, no command structures and no warnings. "Iraq is the biggest terrorist recruitment officer there is, and all the tactics learned in Iraq will soon make their way over to this country," Lund-Lack said.

In this new Britain, the public is not expected to jump terrorists in the street, but Project Griffin intends us to know what to watch for and to report what we see. Soon, we will all be spooks.

http://www.newstatesman.com/200704090021

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

Terrorists 'highly likely' to attack UK

It is "highly likely" that terrorists will try to launch attacks in the UK, Home Secretary John Reid has warned.

Mr Reid said that the terror alert level had remained at "severe" which is the second highest level, for some months.

He was speaking after the first gathering on Thursday of his new Counter-Terrorist Board, which brings together ministers, Whitehall officials and security officers to look at the scale of the threat.

Next week Tony Blair is to chair the monthly Ministerial Committee on Security and Terrorism.

When asked about his current assessment of the threat from terrorists Mr Reid said: "I think the last time we spoke on this some months ago I said it was the second highest level. It's still there.

"It's at what we call severe level, which means that it is highly likely that the terrorists will try to get through and attack us."

He continued: "That's why night and day the security services are working, the police are working to try and defend us all. It's also one of the reasons that we have re-focused the Home Office, because over the last 15 years there are three big problems it faces in terms of security which are international terrorism, international crime and the mass migration of people throughout the world.

"They are other big issues in people's minds and that's why we've refocused the Home Office towards them."

Mr Reid rejected suggestions that Chancellor Gordon Brown was against one of his key counter-terrorism measures, the introduction of ID cards.

There was "no truth" in suggestions that Mr Brown might scrap the ID card scheme if he becomes Prime Minister, said Mr Reid, adding that "we in the Labour Government utterly support it."
http://www.itv.com/news/britain_4d52751 ... c19bf.html

I'm more worried about knife-crime, myself. 8)

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

Six arrested in terror raids

Six men have been arrested in anti-terror dawn raids across London and Luton.

They are believed to include Abu Izzadeen, also known as Omar Brooks, who made headlines when he heckled Home Secretary John Reid at an event last year.

The men are suspected of "inciting others to commit acts of terrorism overseas and terrorist fundraising", a Met police spokesman said.

The Met's Counter Terrorism officers swooped on five addresses in the capital and one in Luton, Bedfordshire.

Searches are ongoing.

The arrests form part of a long-term investigation into radicalisation and funding of international terrorists, Scotland Yard said.

All six suspects are being questioned at a high-security police station in London.

link


edited by TheQuixote: fixing link

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

Pressure mounts for terror leaks inquiry

Pressure is mounting on the Government tonight to order an inquiry into claims by Britain's senior anti-terror police chief that leaks had placed lives at risk.

Although Tony Blair insisted there was no evidence the information came from within Government, Downing Street rejected calls from the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats for an inquiry to find out who was to blame.

David Davis, Tory home affairs spokesman, tonight wrote to Sir Gus O'Donnell, the Cabinet Secretary, formally requesting an inquiry into the complaint by Peter Clarke, Deputy Assistant Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, about "deliberate leaking of highly sensitive operational intelligence" which compromised investigations and in the worst cases put lives at risk.

Last night, Mr Clarke suggested culprits were trying to "squeeze out some short-term presentational advantage" by secretly briefing on anti-terror operations. His comments were seen as an attack on the Government's army of special advisers, or "spin doctors".

He cited leaks during a counter-terrorism operation in Birmingham on January 31 and claims there was an alleged plot to behead a Muslim member of the British Army.

"On the morning of the arrests, almost before the detainees had arrived at the police stations to which they were being taken for questioning, it was clear that key details of the investigation and the evidence had been leaked. This damaged the interview strategy of the investigators, and undoubtedly raised community tensions," Mr Clarke said.

He said people providing off-the-record briefings should be "thoroughly ashamed".

"What I am talking about is the deliberate leaking of highly sensitive operational intelligence, often classified, and the unauthorised release of which can be a criminal offence," he said.

The leaks occurred a day after the arrest of Lord Levy and a day before No 10 admitted that Tony Blair had been interviewed by police for a second time in the cash for honours affair.

At Prime Minister's questions in the Commons, David Cameron called on Mr Blair to set up an immediate inquiry and asked for assurances that no minister, civil servant or special advisor leaked the information.

Mr Blair said as far as he was aware they did not and he brushed aside the call for an inquiry.

Mr Cameron told Mr Blair: "If you don't have a leak inquiry, how on earth can you know?"

Mr Blair criticised Mr Cameron for his suggestion that members of the government were responsible, and challenged the Tory leader to produce any evidence he had to back up his allegation.

"But let me make it absolutely clear that I completely condemn any leaks of sensitive information from whatever quarter," Mr Blair said.

A spokesman for the Conservative Party said later they had "no evidence" that any minister or civil servant was involved in leaking details of the Birmingham investigation, but wanted an inquiry to clear the issue.

Downing Street defended Mr Blair's refusal to set up an inquiry, saying there was no evidence the leaks came from within government. "This is not a matter for us. It is a matter for others," Mr Blair's spokesman said.

The Conservatives and Lib Dems expressed incredulity at Downing Street's reluctance to find out who was to blame for leaks given the Government emphasis on tackling a threat from terrorism.

According to the Tories, in the first three years of the Blair government 60 leak inquiries were ordered - on matters ranging from the cost of a £850,000 makeover for Downing Street for the Blairs to the leaking of a government memo on the Euro.

Mr Davis said he though it would have been "almost automatic" to have an inquiry into a leak relating to counter-terrorism law enforcement.

The Lib Dems produced a dossier of examples of unofficial briefings from Whitehall and Westminster related to anti-terror cases which potentially compromised investigations.

Nick Clegg, the party's home affairs spokesman, said the numerous cases in which "so-called 'Whitehall sources' have sought to provide a spin on ongoing terror investigations shows, there is now real evidence that the Government's culture of spin is undermining rather than strengthening our collective response to the terror threat."

Sir Paul Lever, former chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee, said Mr Clarke appeared to be pinning the blame on "members of the army of media advisers and spin doctors and political advisers we now have in Whitehall".

He told BBC Radio Four's Today programme: "Undoubtedly under this Government, far more people are spending their time trying to present the Government in a good light and trying to extract some political advantage from the events of the day."

Dame Pauline Neville-Jones, former head of the Joint Intelligence Committee, told Channel 4 News: "It’s very serious. I personally think that that’s something the Government ought to be investigating and it ought to be making the results of any such investigation actually known to the public.

"And they ought to prosecute. This is what the Official Secrets Act is there for."


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jh ... aks125.xml

 

[ramonmercado]

Commentary by Bruce Schneier
Politics : Security
Portrait of the Modern Terrorist as an Idiot
06.14.07 | 2:00 AM


This courtroom sketch shows Russell Defreitas at his arraignment in federal court in the borough of Brooklyn, New York. Defreitas was arrested for allegedly plotting to blow up a fuel line that runs to John F. Kennedy International Airport.
AP Photo/Christine Cornell
The recently publicized terrorist plot to blow up John F. Kennedy International Airport, like so many of the terrorist plots over the past few years, is a study in alarmism and incompetence: on the part of the terrorists, our government and the press.

Terrorism is a real threat, and one that needs to be addressed by appropriate means. But allowing ourselves to be terrorized by wannabe terrorists and unrealistic plots -- and worse, allowing our essential freedoms to be lost by using them as an excuse -- is wrong.

The alleged plan, to blow up JFK's fuel tanks and a small segment of the 40-mile petroleum pipeline that supplies the airport, was ridiculous. The fuel tanks are thick-walled, making them hard to damage. The airport tanks are separated from the pipelines by cutoff valves, so even if a fire broke out at the tanks, it would not back up into the pipelines. And the pipeline couldn't blow up in any case, since there's no oxygen to aid combustion. Not that the terrorists ever got to the stage -- or demonstrated that they could get there -- where they actually obtained explosives. Or even a current map of the airport's infrastructure.

But read what Russell Defreitas, the lead terrorist, had to say: "Anytime you hit Kennedy, it is the most hurtful thing to the United States. To hit John F. Kennedy, wow.... They love JFK -- he's like the man. If you hit that, the whole country will be in mourning. It's like you can kill the man twice."

If these are the terrorists we're fighting, we've got a pretty incompetent enemy.

You couldn't tell that from the press reports, though. "The devastation that would be caused had this plot succeeded is just unthinkable," U.S. Attorney Roslynn R. Mauskopf said at a news conference, calling it "one of the most chilling plots imaginable." Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pennsylvania) added, "It had the potential to be another 9/11."

These people are just as deluded as Defreitas.

The only voice of reason out there seemed to be New York's Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who said: "There are lots of threats to you in the world. There's the threat of a heart attack for genetic reasons. You can't sit there and worry about everything. Get a life.... You have a much greater danger of being hit by lightning than being struck by a terrorist."

And he was widely excoriated for it.

This isn't the first time a bunch of incompetent terrorists with an infeasible plot have been painted by the media as poised to do all sorts of damage to America. In May we learned about a six-man plan to stage an attack on Fort Dix by getting in disguised as pizza deliverymen and shooting as many soldiers and Humvees as they could, then retreating without losses to fight again another day. Their plan, such as it was, went awry when they took a videotape of themselves at weapons practice to a store for duplication and transfer to DVD. The store clerk contacted the police, who in turn contacted the FBI. (Thank you to the video store clerk for not overreacting, and to the FBI agent for infiltrating the group.)

The "Miami 7," caught last year for plotting -- among other things -- to blow up the Sears Tower, were another incompetent group: no weapons, no bombs, no expertise, no money and no operational skill. And don't forget Iyman Faris, the Ohio trucker who was convicted in 2003 for the laughable plot to take out the Brooklyn Bridge with a blowtorch. At least he eventually decided that the plan was unlikely to succeed.

I don't think these nut jobs, with their movie-plot threats, even deserve the moniker "terrorist." But in this country, while you have to be competent to pull off a terrorist attack, you don't have to be competent to cause terror. All you need to do is start plotting an attack and -- regardless of whether or not you have a viable plan, weapons or even the faintest clue -- the media will aid you in terrorizing the entire population.

The most ridiculous JFK Airport-related story goes to the New York Daily News, with its interview with a waitress who served Defreitas salmon; the front-page headline blared, "Evil Ate at Table Eight."

Following one of these abortive terror misadventures, the administration invariably jumps on the news to trumpet whatever ineffective "security" measure they're trying to push, whether it be national ID cards, wholesale National Security Agency eavesdropping or massive data mining. Never mind that in all these cases, what caught the bad guys was old-fashioned police work -- the kind of thing you'd see in decades-old spy movies.

The administration repeatedly credited the apprehension of Faris to the NSA's warrantless eavesdropping programs, even though it's just not true. The 9/11 terrorists were no different; they succeeded partly because the FBI and CIA didn't follow the leads before the attacks.

Even the London liquid bombers were caught through traditional investigation and intelligence, but this doesn't stop Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff from using them to justify (.pdf) access to airline passenger data.

Of course, even incompetent terrorists can cause damage. This has been repeatedly proven in Israel, and if shoe-bomber Richard Reid had been just a little less stupid and ignited his shoes in the lavatory, he might have taken out an airplane.

So these people should be locked up ... assuming they are actually guilty, that is. Despite the initial press frenzies, the actual details of the cases frequently turn out to be far less damning. Too often it's unclear whether the defendants are actually guilty, or if the police created a crime where none existed before.

The JFK Airport plotters seem to have been egged on by an informant, a twice-convicted drug dealer. An FBI informant almost certainly pushed the Fort Dix plotters to do things they wouldn't have ordinarily done. The Miami gang's Sears Tower plot was suggested by an FBI undercover agent who infiltrated the group. And in 2003, it took an elaborate sting operation involving three countries to arrest an arms dealer for selling a surface-to-air missile to an ostensible Muslim extremist. Entrapment is a very real possibility in all of these cases.

The rest of them stink of exaggeration. Jose Padilla was not actually prepared to detonate a dirty bomb in the United States, despite histrionic administration claims to the contrary. Now that the trial is proceeding, the best the government can charge him with is conspiracy to murder, kidnap and maim, and it seems unlikely that the charges will stick. An alleged ringleader of the U.K. liquid bombers, Rashid Rauf, had charges of terrorism dropped for lack of evidence (of the 25 arrested, only 16 were charged). And now it seems like the JFK mastermind was more talk than action, too.

Remember the "Lackawanna Six," those terrorists from upstate New York who pleaded guilty in 2003 to "providing support or resources to a foreign terrorist organization"? They entered their plea because they were threatened with being removed from the legal system altogether. We have no idea if they were actually guilty, or of what.

Even under the best of circumstances, these are difficult prosecutions. Arresting people before they've carried out their plans means trying to prove intent, which rapidly slips into the province of thought crime. Regularly the prosecution uses obtuse religious literature in the defendants' homes to prove what they believe, and this can result in courtroom debates on Islamic theology. And then there's the issue of demonstrating a connection between a book on a shelf and an idea in the defendant's head, as if your reading of this article -- or purchasing of my book -- proves that you agree with everything I say. (The Atlantic recently published a fascinating article on this.)

I'll be the first to admit that I don't have all the facts in any of these cases. None of us do. So let's have some healthy skepticism. Skepticism when we read about these terrorist masterminds who were poised to kill thousands of people and do incalculable damage. Skepticism when we're told that their arrest proves that we need to give away our own freedoms and liberties. And skepticism that those arrested are even guilty in the first place.

There is a real threat of terrorism. And while I'm all in favor of the terrorists' continuing incompetence, I know that some will prove more capable. We need real security that doesn't require us to guess the tactic or the target: intelligence and investigation -- the very things that caught all these terrorist wannabes -- and emergency response. But the "war on terror" rhetoric is more politics than rationality. We shouldn't let the politics of fear make us less safe.

- - -


Bruce Schneier is the CTO of BT Counterpane and the author of Beyond Fear: Thinking Sensibly About Security in an Uncertain World.

www.wired.com/politics/security/comment ... tters_0614

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

Dirty bomb threat high and rising

The threat of terrorists attacking Britain with a radioactive 'dirty bomb' has grown rapidly in recent months, a leading defence expert has warned.

Prof Sandra Bell spoke out following the sentencing last week of seven al-Qaeda 'foot soldiers' who had plotted dirty bomb attacks in Britain and the United States.

The men were jailed for a total of 136 years at Woolwich Crown Court. Their leader, Dhiren Barot, is serving life for conspiracy to murder.

Prof Bell, the director of homeland security at the Royal United Services Institute, said: 'The threat from dirty bombs is now higher than it was two years ago, and has increased significantly over the last six months. 'I used to think you had more chance of winning the lottery than of being attacked with radiation weapons, but times are changing.' She said that turmoil in parts of Africa and the former Soviet Union had created a black market in radioactive materials which could be used to lace a conventional bomb. 'Rather than maximise civilian casualties, the terrorists are now trying to cause as much disruption to public services as possible,' she said. 'Widespread radiation emitted by dirty bombs would be ideal for this.' The Sunday Telegraph has learned that in an effort to combat the growing threat, the Government has begun secretly installing radiation detectors and X-ray machines at ports, which are perceived to be less secure than airports. The first of the devices, which scan cargo and containers for hazardous material, is already in operation at Southampton. It has been donated by US authorities under Washington's Secure Freight Initiative.

Detectors have also been installed at Port Busan in South Korea, whose neighbour North Korea exploded an atom bomb in a test last year, and at Port Qasim in Karachi, Pakistan.

Dame Eliza Manningham-Buller, the former head of MI5, warned three years ago that it was 'only a matter of time' until terrorists launched a dirty bomb attack on the West.

link

 

[Pietro_Mercurios]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/terrorism/story/0,,2114743,00.html

Car bomb found in London

Sandra Laville and Hugh Muir. Friday June 29, 2007. Guardian Unlimited

The junction of Coventry Street and Haymarket in central London is cordoned off as police officers investigate a 'viable explosive device'
The junction of Coventry Street and Haymarket in central London is cordoned off as police officers investigate a 'viable explosive device'. Photograph: Clara Molden/PA


A car bomb was today defused in central London after a member of the public alerted Scotland Yard to a suspicious vehicle.

Police are now frantically searching landmark sites across the capital to check for further explosive devices. They are not sure whether the bomb was a lone device or more had been deployed across London.

Specialist teams of bomb disposal officers were deployed to Haymarket, near Piccadilly following the report that a car had been abandoned on the road. Haymarket was closed off while the experts examined the car.

After an initial investigation of the vehicle officers discovered a potentially viable device. It was made safe by bomb disposal experts and forensic explosives experts on the scene began to examine the car.

It is understood the device left in Haymarket was very crudely made.

A police source said they did not know as yet who was responsible. No warnings were received.

The car will be taken to the Forensic Explosives Laboratory at Fort Halstead in Kent, to be examined in a specialist facility known as the Igloo.

Earlier this year Sir Ian Blair, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, warned that what takes place on the streets of Baghdad - where car bombs are a frequent occurrence - could eventally reach London.

It emerged that anti-terrorist police last month were spot-checking lorries on the outskirts of the city amid growing fears that extremists would use a bomb in a vehicle.

But senior police sources have stressed they have no direct intelligence that any group or individual is planning such an attack on London.

 

[Quake42]

Timed, one would assume, to coincide with Gordon taking over as PM and perhaps also the verdict in the 21/7 failed bombings trial (the jury retired yesterday IIRC).

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

Police called to second suspect vehicle in London

LONDON (Reuters) - Police closed a busy street in central London on Friday and were examining a suspicious vehicle there, a spokeswoman said.

"I can confirm police are attending a suspicious vehicle in Park Lane," she said. Park Lane is one of the most prestigious roads in central London.

Earlier on Friday, police said they had found a bomb in a car in another area of central London.

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/ ... _in_london

 

[Anonymous]

Two people have asked me a question during the course of the day yesterday - and I could not really think of a good answer.

Maybe you could.

How did the police know that there was a car with a bomb in it?

I made the following suggestions;

A) They walked by and heard a loud ticking noise.

B) They were tipped off ("...there's a bomb in Piccadilly, in a car, outside Tiger Tiger, and another one in Park Lane...my name? <click...brrrrrrrr>)

How do you think they knew there was a car with a bomb in it?


<EDIT>

I've just read that Reuters article posted above, and apparently ambulance workers saw smoke coming from the car.

I therefore make the supposition that they thought the car was on fire and might blow up - so they called firemen or something who then saw the cannisters of gas and wires and nails and called the bomb squad.

Can anybody verify that this is what happened?

 

[Pietro_Mercurios]

...

I've just read that Reuters article posted above, and apparently ambulance workers saw smoke coming from the car.

I therefore make the supposition that they thought the car was on fire and might blow up - so they called firemen or something who then saw the cannisters of gas and wires and nails and called the bomb squad.

Can anybody verify that this is what happened?

That's the story, Jackanory.

I'm quite interested in the backstory about the 'Tiger, Tiger' nightclub. I heard a patron, a young Ms Patel being interviewed as a witness on BBC radio4. I don't know very much about the place as a venue, but it appears to be a part of a chain in the UK and a bit multicultural:

http://www.tigertiger-london.co.uk/venue/therestaurant/

... The restaurant at Tiger Tiger London is a new dining experience offering a taste of the east plus all the traditional favourites; serving steaks, salads, burgers and fusion dishes ...

The Tiger restaurant is inspired by a fusion of the east and the west, ...

Does anybody have any experience of it, or other Tiger, Tiger clubs? Are they World music, multicultural venues, or what? According to the site the music is generally classic pop, or dance anthems and they're big on hen nights.

Was that significant to the placing of the bomb? What might the implications be?

Where, exactly, was the other bomb placed, in Cockspur Street, before it was towed to Park Lane?

This is London, after all, a very cosmopolitan, multicultural place and she has fallen victim to a very cosmopolitan line up of bombers, in the past. Would that widen the list of suspects?

 

[Pietro_Mercurios]

...

I've just read that Reuters article posted above, and apparently ambulance workers saw smoke coming from the car.

I therefore make the supposition that they thought the car was on fire and might blow up - so they called firemen or something who then saw the cannisters of gas and wires and nails and called the bomb squad.

Can anybody verify that this is what happened?

This comes from the Register. I don't know where it originates from:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/06/29/more_fear_biscuits_please/

...

Today we have news from London, where a "big [explosive] device" was discovered inside a parked car near Piccadilly Circus. The device consisted of petrol, propane gas cylinders, and nails. The car containing it had been abandoned after its driver was observed piloting it erratically, crashing it, then running off, like a true professional. Ambulance workers called to assist nearby noticed what they initially thought was smoke inside the car, but which likely was petrol vapour, and contacted police.

...