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Media cast doubts on London raid

Doubts were growing yesterday over the chemical weapons threat said to be behind a huge anti-terror police raid in London in which a British man was shot then arrested with his brother.

The British press led the chorus of doubts, with a source close to the inquiry telling yesterday's the Guardian newspaper that the chemical weapons sought in the raid on a house in Forest Gate in east London "might be elsewhere or never existed."

"So far, nothing from the search bears out the intelligence," another Scotland Yard source told the paper.

According to their lawyers, brothers Abul Koyair, 20, and Mohammed Abdul Kahar, 23, vehemently deny any involvement in terrorism after they were arrested during a dawn raid on Friday.

Kahar, who was shot during the raid, was moved on Sunday from Royal London Hospital to Paddington Green high security police station, where he was expected to face questioning for the first time. However, his lawyer Kate Roxburgh said on Sunday evening he was still too weak.

Police have declined to comment on the reports that experts were hunting for evidence of chemical or biological weapons as they continued to search the terraced house.

Neighbors in Forest Gate defended the brothers, who were arrested under the Terrorism Act, describing them as devout Muslims from a Bangladeshi family.

"If the intelligence was wrong, we possibly have egg on our faces," another anonymous Scotland Yard source said in the Daily Telegraph.

"We have wasted a lot of time, put a lot of people out, one man has been shot and two have been arrested," he said.

"But what was the alternative: that we didn't act? The bomb might not be there, but if the intelligence was right, has it been moved?" he added.

According to the tabloid Sun, the raid by 250 officers could still yield results.

"Although the bomb is still missing, some evidence was found at the raided house in Forest Gate to suggest potential links to terrorism," the paper said, citing more anonymous sources.

"The informant is highly regarded and was certain what he saw with his own eyes was a chemical bomb. We are still convinced the information is 100 percent accurate," insisted a source within M15, Britain's interior intelligence agency.

The Daily Mail was much less optimistic of a result, and cited several details of the police operation and inquiry which would be particularly disquieting if the bomb threat were real.

Why was the Forest Gate area not evacuated? And why did the police not inform Cobra, the anti-terror committee involving ministers, emergency services and security agencies, of Friday's raid?
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