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London spooked by bus fire as subway reopens

London Underground operators yesterday reopened sections of two subway lines that had been closed since the deadly July 7 bombings, while police maintained a high-profile security operation throughout the network to avert any further attacks.

Officers also continued questioning 20 suspects held in Britain in connection with the botched July 21 bomb attacks on London's transit system, including two men arrested in raids in south London late on Monday. The government, meanwhile, said it was pursuing attempts to extradite one of the suspected attackers from Italy, and pressing forward with its hunt for anyone who assisted the suspected bombers.

The investigation is now focusing on possible links between the terror cell that killed 52 people when it bombed three Underground trains and a red double-decker bus on July 7, and a second cell that targeted the same transportation system two weeks later but caused no deaths when their bombs failed to fully explode.

Police say the four suicide bombers who carried out the July 7 attacks are all dead. And they believe they have arrested all the failed July 21 bombers, whose explosives detonated only partially and took no lives.

On Tuesday, London Underground restored full service on the Hammersmith and City line and the District line, which were partially shut down after the July 7 bombing at Edgware Road station.

Two other lines remain closed or suspended.

British Transport Police continued its highly visible patrolling operation across the capital's subway system and overland rail network yesterday, spokesman Simon Lubin said. Officers in bright yellow jackets were posted outside many stations, although the police presence was not as strong as Thursday, when a massive force patrolled the network exactly three weeks after the first attacks and one week after the second.

Home Office Minister Hazel Blears also planned the first in a series of meetings with representatives of Britain's Muslim community amid increasing complaints that young Muslims were being targeted by police in stop-and-search operations.

"Just picking people up on the basis that they are Muslim is never going to get the results that we want," Blears told the British Broadcasting Corporation's Radio 4 on Tuesday, reversing her earlier support for the controversial police initiative.

"Tackling terrorism is absolutely dependent on the confidence of these communities to feel that they can come forward, give information and be part of the fight against this threat," she said.

Meanwhile, Britain is also "pursuing extradition" of Hamdi Issac, one of the four suspected July 21 attackers who is being held by police in Rome, she said.

Issac was charged on Monday in Italy with association with the aim of international terrorism and possessing false documents, his lawyer Antonietta Sonnessa said. She raised the possibility that investigations in Italy against Issac could hold up his extradition. "One cannot possibly define the timing of the extradition process," Blears said.
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