40 arrested in Italy following Britain’s foiled terror plot

POLICE arrested 40 people in cities throughout Italy in raids on Muslim gathering places in a security crackdown after Britain thwarted an alleged terror plot, the Interior Ministry said last night.

The arrests were made in Rome, Milan, Venice, Florence, Naples and other cities yesterday and “as part of an extraordinary operation that followed the British anti-terrorist operation”, the ministry said.

Twenty-eight people were arrested for violating rules on residence permits and 12 were arrested for property crimes, its statement said.

The raids were made on “Islamic gathering places, including call centres, internet points and money transfer” offices, the ministry said.

Meanwhile, Pakistani intelligence agents claimed there was an al-Qaida connection in the case.

In a statement, Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry said that acting on information received earlier from Britain, Pakistan had made arrests that had triggered further arrests in Britain on August 9 and 10.

Pakistani officials named British national Rashid Rauf as a “key person” who had been arrested in Pakistan.

Interior Minister Aftab Khan Sherpao said that Rauf has ties with al-Qaida.

“We arrested him from the border area and on his disclosure we shared the information with British authorities, which led to further arrests in Britain.”

Foreign Minister Khursheed Kasuri in an interview with CNN confirmed arrests of seven suspects in Pakistan, including Britons.

He said the suspect “had been monitored for quite some time” before they were arrested.

Later, a Pakistani intelligence official said 10 Pakistanis had been arrested yesterday in the eastern district of Bhawalpur, about 310 miles south-west of Islamabad, also in connection with the terror plot.

A second intelligence official confirmed there had been arrests in Bhawalpur, but did not know how many. Sherpao could not confirm the arrests in Bhawalpur.