Britain facing ‘campaign of terror’
London police chief Ian Blair said terrorist cells could still be at large and may be determined to launch new attacks.
Those attacks would not necessarily be on the transport system, he warned.
Three weeks on from the July 7 bombings, and a week on from the failed July 21 attacks, thousands of police flooded the streets of London and there were more officers on the rail system than ever before.
Ian Blair revealed the hunt for the bombers and the operation to protect the capital from further attacks was costing €750,000 a day.
“This is the greatest operational challenge that the Metropolitan Police has faced since the Second World War.
“There is no reason why they are going to stay attacking the transport system,” he said.
He also signalled a move to arm more officers in the wake of the bombings.
“We will have to strengthen, in the next year, the firearms capability of the Metropolitan Police,” he said. “It is not in any sense inadequate but we have to give people rest.”
He revealed tensions between British and US law enforcement agencies over the publication in the US of pictures of the bloody aftermath of the July 7 attacks.
The pictures, which showed the inside of blown-up train carriages and seized bomb-making materials, had been “supplied in confidence to some of our colleague agencies”, he said.
“We have made our concerns known to those agencies,” he added.
As the hunt continues detectives believe the net is closing on one of the July 21 would-be suicide bombers who tried to blow himself up on a Tube train near Shepherd’s Bush in west London.
Armed officers raided a flat in Stockwell, south London on last night where he was believed to have lived.
Three women were arrested on suspicion of harbouring an offender.
Neighbours said they recognised a man shown in a CCTV image released by Scotland Yard which showed the Shepherd’s Bush bomber making his getaway on a bus.
They also said he was married and had three young children.
