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| Britain |
| More on the Glasgow/London jihadi fizzles |
| 2007-07-01 |
| British officials intensified the hunt Sunday for what they called an Al Qaeda-linked network behind three three? attempted terrorist attacks, conducting pinpoint raids across a country. A British government security official said a loose U.K.-wide network appeared to be behind the attacks but investigators were struggling to pin down suspects' identities — even two arrested after they drove a Jeep Cherokee into Glasgow's main airport terminal Saturday and set it ablaze. "These are not the type of people who always carry identity documents, or who use their real identities," the official said on condition of anonymity. Residents of homes neighboring addresses being raided by police in central England and Liverpool claimed the residents were doctors or medical students. Britain's Sky News and several British newspapers reported that two men arrested over the attacks were doctors working in British hospitals. Police in London and Glasgow refused to comment on the claim. The security official said police and MI5, the internal spy agency, did not know if the suspects were British born, from overseas, or some combination of the two, despite local media reports that they were mainly of Middle Eastern origin. Typical Pakistanis with a plethora of passports? Most vehicles were being barred from driving up to airport terminals and air passengers told to use public transport, airline operator BAA PLC said. Random searches were being carried out on vehicles approaching railway stations, British Transport Police said. In Liverpool late Saturday, police arrested a 26-year-old man and then searched two homes on a road near Penny Lane, made famous by the Beatles song. Officers also searched a residential area about a mile from Glasgow's airport and, at the Royal Alexandra Hospital, where the burnt jihadi was taken for treatment carried out a controlled explosion on a suspicious vehicle in the parking lot. "It is believed that this car is connected to yesterday's incident at Glasgow International Airport," Strathclyde Police said in a statement. Police said no explosives were found, but gave no other details. On the Glasgow street where a house was being searched, officers carried crates of items out of the building. Brian Harvey, a 60-year-old construction worker who lives on the street, said he had seen a green SUV parked outside the property being searched. "I saw a green vehicle, a Jeep Cherokee. It seemed unusual, strange over here," Harvey said, explaining that most other vehicles on the street were more modest. He said he knew nothing about the residents of the house, which he said was a rented property. In Staffordshire, neighbors said the residents of a home raided by police included a hospital doctor, his wife and their small child. "The gentleman living there is a hospital doctor," neighbor Daniel Robinson said. "They have been here for just over nine months." Glasgow's Assistant Chief Constable John Malcolm identified the car used in the attack as a green Jeep Cherokee with the license plate L808RDT and asked whether anyone had seen it during the days before the attack. He also appealed for any personal photographs or videos of the attack itself. He said the man hospitalized was the driver and identified the other man as a 27-year-old. |
| Posted by:trailing wife |
| #1 Police also raided a second house on Hatherley Street in Toxteth. Haroon Samad, 56, who lives next door to the house, said: "I heard a noise about midnight last night, a policeman shouting 'Come out with your hands up'." "The police were in uniform and armed." "I saw four people, the men who live at the house, come out with their hands up, and walk calmly towards the police car on the other side of the road. Another police car was stationed at the top of the road." "All the lads who live there are in their 20s. Three are from Pakistan and one from the Yemen." "They said they were students." "The policeman later knocked on my door to apologise for the disturbance. He said later that they had been set free, and are no longer being held." Mr Samad said all the men attended the mosque at the top of the street. |
| Posted by: John Frum 2007-07-01 19:35 |