Britain Under Attack as Bombers Strike at Airport - SPME Scholars for Peace in the Middle East

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article2010062.ece

BRITAIN was last night put on its highest state of security alert after an attempted car firebombing at Glasgow airport raised fears of a new wave of terrorist attacks.

Gordon Brown placed the country on a “critical” threat level, indicating that MI5 believes a terrorist attack is expected “imminently”.

In yesterday’s attack in Glasgow, two Asian-looking men crashed a car into the airport’s main terminal building. Police are linking it to the failed car bomb attack in London’s West End early on Friday morning.

Two men were arrested at the airport. Early this morning antiterrorist police announced they had arrested two further people in Cheshire in connection with the attack.

In a televised statement from Downing Street last night, Brown said there would be heightened security at airports and other crowded places. “The first duty of the government is the security and safety of all the British people. So it is right to raise the levels at airports and other crowded places in light of the threat.

“I want all people to be vigilant and support police in light of the difficult decisions they have to make. I know the British people will stand together, united, resolute and strong.”

It is understood deployment of troops is also being considered at airports, where authorities yesterday increased security within hours of the Glasgow attack. Tighter security is also expected at today’s tribute concert for Princess Diana at Wembley organised by her sons.

In Glasgow, witnesses described how the two men drove the four-wheel-drive vehicle into the doors of the airport’s main terminal building. One of the men got out of the Jeep Cherokee with his clothes on fire. He was restrained by passengers while others put out the flames with a fire extinguisher.

Eyewitness Jackie Kennedy, 46, described how she watched one of the occupants of the car douse himself in petrol and set himself alight.

“He had a big smirk on his face. He lifted up what appeared to be a five-litre drum, which I think had petrol in it, and set himself on fire. His clothes were melting in front of my very eyes.

“The police tried to pounce on him but he fought back and was struggling with them. It was only when a member of the public punched him in the face that the police managed to restrain him. The police were trying to spray CS gas in his face but it was not working.”

On arrival at the Royal Alexandra hospital in Paisley police said he was found to be wearing a “suspect device” – thought to be a suicide belt. The casualty ward was evacuated and hospital workers reported seeing a policeman run from the building and throw a “belt-like” object into a cricket field.

Late last night the Jeep Cherokee used in the attack had still not been forensically examined and its condition was described as ‘highly unstable.’

William Rae, chief constable of Strathclyde police, said they believed it contained inflammable material.

One witness said bottles of petrol had been shaken inside the vehicle in a bid to set it alight. “It looked like Molotov cocktails,” he said.

Rae admitted he could not rule out the vehicle might contain the remains of a third attacker.

Glasgow airport remained closed last night and more than 1,000 passengers who had been due to depart were held on aircraft on the tarmac for more than six hours before being taken away in buses to the city’s Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre to spend the night.

Liverpool John Lennon airport was also closed last night while police examined a suspect car and all airports in the country stopped motorists using kerb-side drop-off zones to leave and collect passengers.

Two men were arrested at the scene of the Glasgow attack and one was said to be in a critical condition with severe burns.

Within hours of the attack Brown convened a meeting of Cobra, the government’s emergency response committee, to assess the implications. It followed a meeting earlier in the day to discuss the attempted car bombings in the West End.

There, two Mercedes cars were packed with gas cylinders, petrol and nails and primed to detonate within 200 yards of each other as nightclubs emptied onto the streets. Experts say the bombs were designed to create a huge fireball.

Jacqui Smith, the new home secretary, confirmed the raised security alert was “in response to the events of the last 48 hours”. It was last at “critical” last August after the foiled airline bomb plots.

Rae said members of SO15, the Met’s counter-terrorism unit, travelled to Scotland last night to help with the investigation. “We believe the incident at Glasgow airport is linked to the events in London,” he said. “There are very similar features to both incidents and we are able to link both incidents. We can confirm that this is being treated as a terrorist incident.”

He said no advance intelligence had been received about the attempt although ABC News quoted an unnamed American law enforcement officer claiming US officials had received intelligence reports two weeks ago warning of a possible terror attack in Glasgow against “airport infrastructure or aircraft”.

The Yard declined to comment on reports that it had managed to identify three possible suspects in the West End attack.

Well-placed security sources said the Met and MI5 had called in armed surveillance teams from the army’s Special Reconnaissance Regiment to help track down the car bomb suspects. The same unit, along with armed surveillance officers from the Met’s Counter-Terrorist Command (CTC), was involved in a hunt for five alleged would-be suicide bombers.

The Ministry of Defence declined to comment on reports that the regiment and the SAS, which now has a forward base in west London, had been called in to help with the police manhunt.

A senior Whitehall official did say, however, that police hoped for an early breakthrough. “It’s promising. We are on the trail. They [the CTC] are confident they will get to the bottom of it.” The consensus among senior law enforcement officials was that the West End attack bore the hall-marks of an Islamist terror attack directed by “core Al-Qaeda” figures in Pakistan.

Mayor Ken Livingstone urged Londoners to remain vigilant. “The discovery of two potential car bombs in central London, with those responsible still at large, means we face a very real terrorist threat,” he said.

Sources suggested the government was likely to use the latest attacks as an opportunity to impose tougher control orders on those terror suspects it has been unable to jail because of a lack of evidence admissible in court.

Seven of the 17 people so far placed on control orders have absconded in recent months. They include a suspect who was previously said to have been interested in carrying out a car bomb attack against a London night-club. The tougher controls would include longer curfews and police guards on suspects’ homes.