Terror attack still 'highly likely'

Terror attack still 'highly likely'

JAMES KIRKUP POLITICAL EDITOR

IT IS "highly likely" that radical Muslim groups will attempt a deadly attack in Britain despite the apparent success of last week's high-profile anti-terror arrests, the government warned yesterday. As police continued to question 23 people accused of plotting to bomb US-bound airliners, John Reid, the Home Secretary, made clear that the arrests had not removed or even significantly reduced the terrorist threat to the UK.

In a BBC interview, Mr Reid also confirmed that, as The Scotsman reported on Saturday, MI5 and counter-terrorism police officers are monitoring dozens of cells believed to be at various stages of planning acts of violence. Ministers and officials are jubilant about the outcome of last week's operation - which followed months of surveillance - but they are also desperate to avoid giving the impression that the arrests have changed the wider security situation. Underlining that point, Mr Reid yesterday repeated earlier statements that at least four other major conspiracies have been disrupted in Britain since last summer, each with the capacity to cause mass casualties. MI5 estimates that there are more than 1,000 people in Britain who are prepared to engage in terrorism. "We think we have the main suspects in this particular plot. I have to be honest and say on the basis of what we know, there could be others out there," Mr Reid said. "So the threat of a terrorist attack in the UK is still very substantial - it is highly likely there would be another terrorist attempt and that is one thing of which we can be sure." The "nightmare scenario" being examined by MI5 and Scotland Yard is that the plotters detained last week could have been working with other, unidentified radical groups who could yet try to stage suicide bomb attacks on Transatlantic flights. The risk of attacks from new groups has helped persuade the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre to hold the official threat level at Critical - the highest possible - even though the main bomb plotters are now in custody. Mr Reid was asked about the "dozens" of networks the Security Service is tracking, and confirmed the scale of MI5's concerns. Bringing a successful criminal prosecution against the people arrested last week will be a crucial test of the government's credibility on security matters. Some lawyers are concerned that some of the public comment about those detained - including statements by Mr Reid and the Treasury's decision to name 19 of them when freezing their assets - could prejudice any eventual trial. Trying to allay those fears, Lord Goldsmith, the Attorney General, yesterday insisted that ministers have not compromised the presumption of the suspects' innocence. The law officer also echoed a request from Scotland Yard for the media not to publish information about those arrested. Despite that request, the Sunday Times yesterday reported that one of those detained is effectively al-Qaeda's commander in Britain, a leading extremist also linked to other terror plots. • Mr Reid also confirmed yesterday that he and other senior government ministers want to make a fresh attempt to increase to 90 days the time during which the police can hold a terror suspect without bringing charges. But the Home Secretary said the immediate aftermath of an anti-terror operation was "not the right time" to have the debate. Related topic Terrorism in the UK http://news.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=758

This article: http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/uk.cfm?id=1180752006

Last updated: 14-Aug-06 02:02 BST