Blair rules out new probe into 7/7 attacks

TONY BLAIR yesterday ruled out demands for a new inquiry into the July 7 bombings amid claims that MI5 overlooked crucial evidence which could have prevented the attacks.

In the Commons, the prime minister said a fresh inquiry would be a “mistake” and would undermine support for the security services in the fight against terrorism.

His comments came amid reports that MI5 did not show surveillance photographs of the bombers’ ringleader Mohammed Sidique Khan to the original inquiry by the parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC).

The BBC reported that although MI5 had six photographs of Khan taken during the investigation of another terror plot, only one was shown to the ISC.

Whitehall sources said that while the committee did not see the photographs, it was told that they existed.

“The reason they were not shown them is because it didn’t add to the facts,” one source said.

The committee is to look at the evidence again in the wake of the disclosures in the fertiliser bomb plot trial which ended this week at the Old Bailey with the convictions of five defendants.