THIS NEWS ABOUT THE LONDON TERRER ATTACKS
UNITED WE STAND
JULY.10.2005
afford to ignore: What if the terrorists behind last week's deadly bombings strike again?
Authorities have warned that the terror cell that carried out Thursday's bombings of three crowded
rush-hour Underground trains and a double-decker bus may be intact and capable of more strikes.
The threat raises troubling questions about whether
from concerted attack — and whether any plan could work.
London covers about 600 square miles, presenting terrorists with a wide range of tempting and
perhaps unprotectable targets: a vast subway system used daily by 3 million people; more than
5,000 pubs, many so crowded in the evenings that patrons spill out onto the sidewalks; and 30
million tourists a year, often wandering the city in large groups.
"Our fear is of course of more attacks," Home Secretary Charles Clarke, the Cabinet minister
responsible for law and order, said Sunday.
"Those who carried out this terrible act may well try to carry it out again," Defense Secretary
John Reid said, echoing that warning.
It didn't happen after al-Qaida's
the March 2004 train bombings in
But authorities, warning that anything is possible, said they're working to contain the threat
by boosting police patrols, deploying more undercover officers and restricting the movements
of known suspects. Some
for weapons or explosives.
Lawmakers, meanwhile, are renewing a push to introduce a national system of high-tech biometric
ID cards, including fingerprints and iris scans, that has met with resistance from civil libertarians.
The measures being taken or considered suggest
LONDON - Police believe they have identified all four suicide bombers who carried out the deadly
attacks on London subway trains and a bus last week, the city's police chief said Thursday.
Metropolitan Police Commissioner Ian Blair told the Foreign Press Association that police believe
"that we know who the four people carrying the bombs were ... and we believe they are all dead."
"We are as certain as we can be that four people were killed and they were the four people carrying
bombs," Blair said.
His comments were the first public confirmation from police that the July 7 attackers were suicide
bombers. Bombs exploded on three subway trains and a double-decker bus, killing at least 53 people,
including the attackers.
Peter Clarke, head of the Metropolitan Police anti-terrorist branch, on Thursday identified the suspected
suicide bomber who blew up the double-decker bus, killing 13 people, as Hasib Hussain, 18. Clarke also said
Shahzad Tanweer, 22, was responsible for attacking a subway train between the
Aldgate stations. Both are Britons of Pakistani descent.
News reports have identified the other two as Mohammed Sidique Khan, 30, another Briton of Pakistani
descent, and Lindsey Germaine, a Jamaican-born Briton.
Blair declined to comment on those reports, and he would not say how many suspects are being sought.
"We don't know if there is a fifth man, or a sixth man, a seventh man," he said, but added that police were
trying to determine who organized the attack.
Two claims of responsibility purportedly from militant Islamic groups have surfaced.
Commenting on the possible role of al-Qaida, Blair said, "Al-Qaida is not an organization. Al-Qaida is a way
of working ... but this has the hallmark of that approach."
"Al-Qaida clearly has the ability to provide training ... to provide expertise ... and I think that is what has
occurred here," Blair said.
The Times of
Magdy el-Nashar, 33, an Egyptian-born academic who recently taught chemistry at
The Times said he was believed to have rented one of the homes being searched in
A spokesman at
beginning in January 2000.
Saad Khan, the chemical engineering department's director of graduate programs, said he
remembered that el-Nashar applied for admission while living in
semester in 2000, el-Nashar had decided to pursue a doctorate at
In a statement Thursday,
research, sponsored by the
"We understand he was seeking a postdoctorate position in the
was updated by the Home Office earlier this year. He has not been seen on the campus since the
beginning of July."
Neighbors said el-Nashar recently left
The Daily Telegraph said police were trying to identify a man seen standing near the four suspects
on the
The Evening Standard reported that police spotted a fifth man on closed-circuit TV of the group at
London's King's Cross station about 20 minutes before the explosions.
Late Wednesday, Scotland Yard said anti-terror police had raided a residence northwest of
Officers carried out a forensic examination, but police would not say why they targeted the house on
a residential street in Aylesbury, about 40 miles from London and 20 miles from Luton where a
vehicle believed to be linked to the attacks was towed away Wednesday.
Reports said Tanweer had been arrested once for shoplifting, and Hussain was once questioned for
disorderly behavior.
The Independent newspaper, citing police sources, said one of the four had been linked loosely to a
plot to build a large bomb near
described the link as a low-level "association."
That appeared to be a reference to a ring cracked in March 2004, when eight men were arrested
across southern
a chemical fertilizer used in many bomb attacks. Several have been charged and face trial.
LONDON - Investigators will need months to uncover the planning and financial network behind the
four young men who blew themselves up in Britain's first suicide attacks, police chiefs said on Thursday
Thousands of Londoners held a vigil in
after the bombings on three underground trains and a bus were blamed on three British Muslims of
Pakistani origin and a Jamaican-born Briton.
Joined by others from
to a standstill at
Defiantly celebrating what they called a multi-cultural, multi-faith capital, Londoners from all backgrounds
vowed their way of life would carry on despite last week attacks.
"Those who came here to kill last Thursday had many goals, but one was that we should turn on each
other, like animals trapped in a cage, and they failed, totally and utterly," London Mayor Ken Livingstone
told the crowd.
However, police puzzled over why one of the four attackers blew himself up 57 minutes after the other three.
They issued his photo along with an appeal for clues from the public.
"Al Qaeda clearly has the ability to provide training, to provide briefing and to provide expertise, and that is
what occurred here and what occurred in Madrid," said Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair,
drawing parallels with last year's attacks that killed 191 in the Spanish capital.
"We have to find who planned it, where did the finances come from, where have the explosives gone?"
SUPPORT NETWORK
Anti-terrorism police chief Peter Clarke said that, beyond the identity of the attackers, police wanted to
know: "Who supported them? Who financed them? Who trained them? Who encouraged them?
"This will take many months of intensive detailed investigation."
The comments were the most explicit so far showing police believed an expert support network lay
behind the four bombers.
Security analysts have said it is inconceivable the four -- the youngest only 18 -- could have carried out
attacks that required complex planning, careful selection of targets, access to high explosives and a
detailed knowledge of bomb-making.
The four men were captured on security cameras just before
station, about 20 minutes before three bombs exploded simultaneously aboard subway trains heading
south, east and west.
The fourth bomb went off 57 minutes later on a bus. The reasons for the delay and the different choice
of target remain a mystery.
Clarke released pictures of Hasib Hussain, the teenager who police believe carried the bus bomb, and
appealed to the public for information about his final movements.
"The question I'm asking the public is: Did you see this man at King's Cross?" said Clarke.
"Was he alone or with others? Do you know the route he took from the station? Did you see him get onto
a Number 30 bus? And if you did, where and when was that?"
Police searches were continuing in
of
had made to the country. Family members have said one of them briefly attended a religious school in
SILENT TRIBUTE
Earlier, millions throughout
Workers in
traffic came to a halt as thousands of people gathered in the hot sun for two minutes' quiet reflection.
"One City, One World," read a banner in the square, scene of joyous celebrations just a day before the
bombings when
"I just lost one of my best mates -- but two minutes ain't going to bring him back," said Declan O'Hora, 22,
contemplating the death of his childhood friend Ciaran Cassidy at King's Cross station.
Prime Minister
Tony Blair, who has said he would look urgently at new measures to tackle extremism, marked the
silence in the garden of his Downing Street office, while Queen Elizabeth observed it at Buckingham Palace.
Tributes were also paid in
network in the past -- and in cities across