Police mounted increased patrols in a jittery London yesterday as detectives conducted an intense hunt for a man seen running from an explosives-packed car in the heart of the city's entertainment district.
Two Mercedes loaded with gasoline, gas canisters and nails were found abandoned on Friday, in what police believe was an attempt to kill scores or even hundreds of people. Detectives said they were keeping an open mind about the perpetrators, but terrorism experts said the signs pointed to an al-Qaeda-linked or inspired cell.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown was briefed on the investigation and the security threat by counterterrorism officers at Scotland Yard yesterday, the prime minister's office said.
Police would not comment on a report by ABC News in the US that police had a "crystal clear" picture of one suspect from CCTV footage.
Forensics experts were searching the two cars for clues. One was abandoned outside a nightclub in Haymarket, a busy street of shops, clubs, theaters and restaurants just meters from Trafalgar Square and Piccadilly Circus.
The other was towed after being parked illegally in nearby Cockspur Street and was discovered in an impound lot about 1.5km away in Park Lane, near Hyde Park.
Deputy Assistant Commissioner Peter Clarke, the Metropolitan Police anti-terrorism chief, said the two devices could have caused "significant injury or loss of life."
"The discovery of what appears to be a second bomb is obviously troubling, and reinforces the need for the public to be alert," he said.
The plot rattled London a week before the second anniversary of the July 7 suicide bombings that killed 52 commuters and two days after Brown succeeded Tony Blair as prime minister.
Brown urged people to be alert, saying Britain faced "a serious and continuous security threat."
The government's crisis committee, code-named COBRA, was due to meet yesterday, and police said they were strengthening patrols in the city to reassure the public.
Terrorism experts said the improvised devices discovered on Friday were similar to ones used by homegrown terror cells -- much like the bombs used in the July 7 attacks -- although the discovery of the second device suggested a coordinated and more sophisticated attack, possibly a homegrown terror cell with links to al-Qaeda in Pakistan.
Intelligence officials were examining a post on an Islamist Web site hours before the cars were found suggesting Britain would be attacked for awarding a knighthood to Salman Rushdie and for intervening in Muslim countries.
The US-based SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors extremist Web sites, said a post on the al-Hesbah forum asked: "Is London craving explosions from al-Qaeda?"
"I say the good news, by Allah, London will be hit."
SITE said the message had been posted to an unmoderated, public section of the forum, and its relationship, if any, to the car bombs could not be verified.
The first bomb was discovered after ambulance crews were called to Haymarket to treat a man injured in a fall at 1:30am on Friday.
When crews arrived, they noticed smoke coming from a green Mercedes parked in front of a club, Clarke said.
Photographs showed a canister bearing the words "patio gas," indicating it was propane, next to the car. The back door was open with blankets spilling out. The car was removed from the scene after a bomb squad disabled the explosives.
Sky News television reported that a police officer seized a telephone from the first car -- believed to have been a potential detonator.
Around 3:30am, a second car parked on nearby Cockspur Street was ticketed and then towed to a lot on Park Lane, Clarke said. Police closed off Park Lane, reportedly after attendants smelled gasoline.
Clarke said police were examining footage from closed-circuit TV cameras, hoping the surveillance network in central London would help them track down the drivers of the Mercedes.
The CCTV footage will be compared with license plate recognition software, he said.
There had been no prior intelligence of planned al-Qaeda attacks, a British government official said on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the investigation.
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