The Times in London reports as the bombing mysteries continue to unfold. For one thing, evidence indicates that there was a fifth bomber.
Police fear that there may have been a fifth bomber who failed to carry out his suicide mission last Thursday after the discovery of a suspect package in bushes near Wormwood Scrubs prison in West London.The package, found on Saturday morning, appeared to be packed with explosives, nails and bolts, similar to the device found at Warren Street. Police carried out a series of controlled explosions on it.
The four fugitives whose bombs failed to explode must know they cannot stay in one place for long. Their names are known to police, who are trying to find out if these are the men’s real identities. Many identification documents and other evidence had been cut into pieces but were carried in the rucksacks. Detectives are also studying telephone calls believed to link this cell with the four who blew themselves up on July 7.
Police still retain the authority to use deadly force.
More undercover marksmen will be deployed on the streets of London today after it emerged that a fifth bomber may be on the loose after Thursday’s failed bomb attacks.Despite calls for an inquiry into Scotland Yard’s tactics after the killing of an innocent Brazilian, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Ian Blair, insisted that shoot-to-kill orders will stay in force.
Security forces fear that the four gang members — all believed to be London-based and of East African origin — will strike again before they are found or the explosives degrade.
Sir Ian said that his force took full responsibility for the death of Jean Charles de Menezes, a 27-year-old electrician, but said that there would be no change of orders to his 2,000 armed officers. Politicians and police chiefs believe that the risk of more mass killings is graver than another blunder.
Contrary to some "experts" who say the London attacks were local responses to British support of the Iraq war, a known jihadist operative considered to be the British leader of al Qaeda has been nabbed and may have been the mastermind.
Haroon Rashid Aswat has emerged as the figure that Scotland Yard have been hunting since he flew out of Britain just hours before the attacks which killed 56 people.Aswat, 30, who is believed to come from the same West Yorkshire town as one of the bombers, arrived in Britain a fortnight before the attacks to orchestrate final planning for the atrocity. He spoke to the suicide team on his mobile phone a few hours before the four men blew themselves up and killed fifty-two other people.
Intelligence sources told The Times that during his stay Aswat visited the home towns of all four bombers as well as selecting targets in London.
Aswat has been known to Western intelligence services for more than three years after the FBI accused him of trying to set up al-Qaeda training camps in the US. When he was arrested in a madrassa (religious school), Aswat is understood to have been posing as a businessmen and using a false name. He was picked up in a raid at a madrassa at Sargodha, 90 miles from Islamabad, by Pakistani intelligence officials and flown to a jail in the capital.
Security sources there told The Times that he was armed with a number of guns, wearing an explosive belt and carrying around £17,000 in cash. He had a British passport and was about to flee across the border to Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, The Guardian reports that both groups of bombers had a connection: whitewater rafting in Wales. Charming.
Links have been uncovered between the two teams of bombers who have brought terror to the streets of London over the past two weeks, say security sources.Posted by Alan at July 25, 2005 12:48 AMPolice now believe some of the men they are pursuing for last week's abortive attacks - on Shepherd's Bush, Oval and Warren Street tube stations and on a No 26 bus in Hackney - attended a whitewater rafting trip at the same centre as two of the 7 July bombers, Mohammad Sidique Khan and Shehzad Tanweer.
This raises the distinct possibility that the two operations were connected as part of a larger plan to bring carnage to the capital.
Evidence discovered in the rucksacks left behind by the failed bombers led police to three addresses in London. When investigators cross-referenced them with the electoral register they discovered names that tallied with those of individuals who attended the outdoor adventure course in Snowdonia last summer.