Arrests raise fears of terror attacks in Britain

THE arrests of 16 al-Qaida suspects yesterday in Spain and the discovery of explosives and maps of the London underground in an Italian raid have heightened fears that Britain is being targeted by Islamic extremist groups.

The biggest ever police anti-terrorist operation in Britain has seen a series of raids in locations throughout the country.

Most worrying for the British authorities was the discovery of the deadly poison ricin in a raid on a house in North London in January. The poison appeared to be the remains of a larger amount and a major operation was launched to find the rest.

The British government has issued several general warnings that Britain could be a target in the wake of September 11.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair told Parliament last month that “barely a day goes by” without some new piece of intelligence warning of threats to British interests. Mr Blair said his government was spending “hundreds of millions of pounds” to prepare for a possible attack.

“We could spend tens of billions of pounds doing it, and we could still not identify where the attack was actually going to come from,” he said.

Mr Blair said it was “inevitable” the al-Qaida network would try to attack Britain.

Italian media reported yesterday that police had found a map of central London, as well as explosives, when they arrested five Moroccans in the northern city of Rovigo earlier this week.

In Spain, authorities said 16 suspected al-Qaida members arrested yesterday were linked to terror cells in Britain and France.

Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar said police had thwarted a “major terrorist attack”.

In an assessment of British security services in 2001, the potential threats were listed as: a nuclear attack; an attack on the London underground, using an improvised explosive device, and a chemical or biological attack, for example, on the Tube.

The British government has published plans on how it might cope with a bio-terror attack involving smallpox.

These include the vaccination of small numbers of military and medical specialists who would swing into action in the event of biological attack.

British police authorities said yesterday that all officers would be instructed on how to deal with possible suicide bomb attacks.

Barbara Wilding, chairman of the Association of Chief Police Officers’ national working group on suicide terrorism, said the advice to officers was “do not intervene and do not challenge.”

“We know al-Qaida has the capability,” Ms Wilding was quoted as saying by Police Review magazine.

“Clearly, we would be failing in our duty if we did not take this seriously,” she added.