Mon, Apr 10, 2006 page6

• London bombers `acted alone'

  AMATEUR OPERATION A UK inquiry has found that the bombings were planned using information available on the Internet and that al-Qaeda was not involved

  • THE OBSERVER
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  The official inquiry into the July 7 bombings in London will say the attack was planned on a shoestring budget from information on the Internet, that there was no "fifth bomber" and that there was no direct support from al-Qaeda, although two of the bombers had visited Pakistan.

  The first forensic account of the atrocity that claimed the lives of 52 people, which will be published in the next few weeks, will say that London attacks were the product of a "simple and inexpensive" plot hatched by four British suicide bombers bent on martyrdom.

  Far from being the work of an international terror network, as originally suspected, the attack was carried out by four men who had scoured terror sites on the Internet. Their knapsack bombs cost only a few hundred US dollars, according to the first completed draft of the government's definitive report into the blasts.

  The Home Office (interior ministry) account, compiled by a senior civil servant at the behest of Home Secretary (interior minister) Charles Clarke, also discounts the existence of a fifth bomber. After the bombings, police found an unused explosive rucksack in the bombers' abandoned car at Luton station, which led to a manhunt for a missing suspect.

  Similarly, it found nothing to support the theory that an al-Qaeda fixer, presumed to be from Pakistan, was instrumental in planning the attacks.

  A Whitehall source said: "The London attacks were a modest, simple affair by four seemingly normal men using the Internet."

  Confirmation of the nature of the attacks will raise fresh concerns over the vulnerability of Britain to an attack by small, unsophisticated groups. A fortnight after July 7, an unconnected group of four bombers tried to duplicate the bombings, but their bombs failed to detonate.

  The official Home Office report does, however, decide that the four suicide bombers -- Sidique Khan, Hasib Hussain, Shehzad Tanweer and Germaine Lindsay -- were partly inspired by Khan's trips to Pakistan, though the meeting between the four men and known militants in Pakistan is seen as ideological, rather than fact-finding.

  The videotape of Mohammed Sidique Khan released after the attacks also featured Osama bin Laden's deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri. The Home Office believes the tape was edited after the suicide attacks and dismisses it as evidence of al-Qaeda's involvement.

  Khan is confirmed as ringleader of the attacks, though the Yorkshire-born bomber's apparent links to other suspected terrorists are not gone.

  The report also investigates the psychological make-up and behavior of the four bombers during the run-up to the attack. Using intelligence compiled in the nine months since, the account paints a portrait of four British men who in effect led double lives. It exposes how the quartet adopted an extreme interpretation of Islam, juxtaposed with a willingness to enjoy a "Western" lifestyle. In particular Germaine Lindsay, the bomber from Berkshire, is described as leading a fast life.

  The attacks were largely motivated by concerns over foreign policy and the perception that it was deliberately anti-Muslim, although the four were also driven by the promise of immortality.

  Today, the UK's first center for developing techniques to identify and cope with suicide attacks, new biological threats and even roadside bombs will go operational at the government's chemical warfare research establishment at Porton Down, Wiltshire.

  Forensic experts, scientists and technological experts will use the most recent intelligence on terrorist weaponry and tactics to devise new defenses as Britain seeks to keep abreast of the evolving threat from the likes of al-Qaeda. In the event of a future attack, forensic material would be sent to Porton Down rather than to the government's forensic explosives laboratory at Fort Halstead, Kent.

  Scientists will begin working on designing sophisticated X-ray scanners and robotic appliances to defuse bombs, and researching into how closed-circuit television footage could be used more effectively to identify terrorism suspects.
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