Special Report: Major UK air terror plot thwarted
BEIJING, Aug. 12 -- Britain named 19 people on Friday suspected of an Islamist plot to blow up transatlantic airliners and ordered their assets frozen, a day after police said they had foiled "murder on an unimaginable scale."
US officials said suspected suicide bombers were just days from simultaneous attacks on up to 10 aircraft flying from Britain to the United States, raising the spectre of strikes to rival the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.
The arrest of 24 suspects prompted strict security measures that brought chaos to Britain's airports at the height of the holiday season, with hundreds of flights cancelled. Measures were still in place on Friday, causing long queues.
"I think we are both going to kiss the ground when we touch it in Los Angeles," said Mandy Macdonald, a US resident waiting to catch a plane from London's Heathrow Airport.
Police said the plan was to blow up planes with chemical bombs smuggled on board disguised as drinks. The US Homeland Security Department said the 24 people arrested in raids between Wednesday night and Thursday were British Muslims.
The Bank of England, acting on instructions from the government, published the names and addresses of 19 suspects, saying it would be illegal to release their funds.
Those arrested are aged from 17 to 35 and live in east London, the town of High Wycombe, west of the capital, and Britain's second city of Birmingham.
Pakistan said it had played an important role in thwarting the suspected plot. A senior government official said it had arrested two Britons of Pakistani descent last week, calling them "key catches," along with five others.
The suspected plot came to light 13 months after four British Islamist suicide bombers killed 52 people and injured about 700 on London's transport network. At least two of the militants had visited Pakistan months before the attack.
US Homeland Security Adviser Fran Townsend said the plot had "all the hallmarks" of links to al-Qaida. "We just need a little more time to put together those links," she told CBS News. British police have played down direct involvement by the global militant group.
Last month al-Qaida, several of whose leaders are thought to be hiding on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, urged Muslims to fight those backing Israel's strikes on Lebanon and warned of attacks unless US and British forces left Iraq and Afghanistan.
British Interior Minister John Reid said police were confident all the main figures had been caught, but that the country's security threat level would be kept at its highest level, "critical," for the time being.
US TV network ABC quoted unidentified US officials on Thursday as saying five suspects were still on the loose. But a British police spokeswoman said on Friday they had arrested everybody they wanted to arrest.
"Clearly there might be other people out there who are part of it. We might turn things up that suggest there are other people out there," she said.
(Source: China Daily)
