MSP's assistant receives toxic package

A Scottish politician says a female assistant has received a toxic package.

Police believe it was sent by extremist Scottish nationalists who also targeted Cherie Blair.

Liberal Democrat MSP Mike Rumbles says the package was sent to the home of the worker at his constituency office in Banchory, Aberdeenshire.

She did not open the package, which contained a bottle of supposed aromatherapy oil, and was not harmed.

Mr Rumbles said: "I am extremely angry at this quite despicable act, the police are onto it and I hope they get the perpetrators as quickly as possible."

The MSP said he had been tipped off about the package by a newspaper in Glasgow yesterday afternoon. He immediately came off the phone to warn the woman helper not to open the container, which she had received that morning.

"As soon as I got off the phone from the News of the World, I was straight on to the phone to the woman. Luckily, I managed to warn her before she opened the bottle, although she had opened the parcel it was contained in."

Sources have also confirmed a package sent to 10 Downing Street containing highly-corrosive caustic soda had been addressed to the Prime Minister's wife.

Scotland Yard said it had received a call from a man claiming to be from the Scottish National Liberation Army saying 16 packages had been sent. Only three have been received so far. Scotland Yard has described the substance as "cynically dangerous".

A Scotland Yard spokesman says police are warning anyone who receives a suspicious package through the post to ring 999 immediately: "We believe this is especially applicable to members of the political parties and their members of staff."