Open-mouthed neighbours awake to a police operation as houses and cars searched

[Snowden]

You cannot help admiring the way the British go about rounding up the perpetrators in matters such as this. Of course, they have had considerable experience with dealing with terrorists, and panic isn't their middle name. So they take these things as they come. Even so, it is surprising that they have managed to gather as much evidence and information as they have done, as fast as they have.

Open-mouthed neighbours awake to a police operation as houses and cars searched

A home five miles west of Glasgow may have been rented by the would-be airport bombers and officers were also in action in the city, on the M6 in Cheshire and in Staffordshire

David Lister, Rajeev Syal and Melanie Reid



Residents of the affluent commuter village of Houston, five miles west of Glasgow, woke early yesterday to find that they had been living among terrorist suspects.

Roused by the sound of a disturbance on a quiet Sunday morning, some stood opened-mouthed as men in white biological suits walked out of a semi-detached house at 5am clutching plastic bags of evidence.

Aileen Hill, 47, who lives across the street, struggled to take in what was happening. “I cannot believe it,” she said. “This is just a small place that nobody has ever heard of. When you tell people you are from Houston they think you live in America.”

Her shock was understandable, given the breathtaking pace of events. Over the past three days, anti-terrorist police have attempted to track down an Islamist cell that has attempted to kill and maim thousands. It has led detectives to Houston’s manicured lawns, which have been kept in pristine condition by bankers, lawyers and office workers.

Detectives are trying to establish whether the house’s occupants are the same men arrested after a burning Jeep drove at high speed and filled with petrol and gas cylinders into the main terminal of Glasgow International airport. The two Asian residents who lived in Houston are believed to have moved in within the past month, signing a six-month tenancy agreement to rent the two-bedroom house on one of the village’s less salubrious streets. They rarely, if ever, stopped to chat to neighbours.

One neighbour claimed that one of the men owned a Jeep. Mya Logan, 29, said: “The only time I saw anybody from that house was a Saturday morning when I was on my way to work. He had a Jeep and he was giving it a wash — hosing it down.”

Daniel Gardiner, who owns the agency that let the house, said that police had interviewed his staff with a particular interest in whom the two men had been speaking to.

“The officers seemed to know an awful lot about the tenants when they spoke to us. They had all the phone records from our company to their numbers and wanted to know who had made the calls,” he said.

The alleged attackers of Glasgow airport were also both Asian, according to witnesses. They had been apprehended after a determined, if ultimately amateurish, attempt to kill hundreds of holidaymakers. One had set himself alight and thrown petrol bombs through a broken terminal window, witnesses claimed. The other was restrained after trying to run away from security guards, it was reported.

The police believe that the attempted attack at the airport may be linked with two car bombs that were spotted and defused on Friday in Central London.

By Saturday night, the police had already tracked down others they wished to question. About 230 miles (370km) south of Glasgow, commuters driving home at dusk on the M6 through Cheshire watched as a dozen police cars sped along the fast lane.

Three unmarked police cars moved in front of the formation and forced a silver saloon on to the hard shoulder with a sudden stop. The car’s three occupants were then arrested at gunpoint, according to witnesses.

A 27-year-old woman described as wearing Islamic head-dress and a 26-year-old man man wearing a suit were taken to a Central London police station. They had been tracked by anti-terrorism officers from the Metropolitan Police and West Midlands Police.

One witness, Peter Whitehead, told the BBC that three unmarked police cars brought traffic to a halt on the motorway. “In front of them were a couple of other unmarked police cars and they forced a car on to the hard shoulder and got the occupants out and as far as I can see arrested them.”

Less than 20 miles away in south Liverpool, residents heard armed police break down the doors of two terraced houses yesterday morning. A man, 26, was arrested during the morning after being stopped while driving through the city.

Rachal Tansey, 27, a student who lives opposite one of the houses, said that the commotion woke her at 1am. “I looked out of the bathroom window and saw men with big guns, and they barged in. There was a commotion,” she said.

The police were involved in other dramatic operations in connection with their investigation. A car was blown up by the police at the Royal Alexandra hospital in Glasgow where the driver injured in the airport attack was being treated, the police said. The car was believed to be linked to the airport attack, the spokesman confirmed.

In Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire, police raided a detached three-bedroom house in connection with the London and Glasgow attacks. The home, which belongs to a married Lebanese doctor, was raided at about 10pm on Saturday. The doctor works at the North Staffordshire Hospital, Stoke-on-Trent, and has a wife and baby boy. The house was surrounded by police and forensic science experts yesterday.

Forensic science experts also erected a tent in the back garden and removed black bags from the house to be taken away for testing.

The cycle of events began on the early hours of Friday when alleged car bombs were found and defused in the West End. The first, found at 1am outside Tiger Tiger nightclub, was spotted by two ambulance workers who saw smoke rising from among gas cannister and bags of nails.

Later that day, the police cordoned off Park Lane, Mayfair, after a suspect device was found in an underground car park.

Those arrested in connection with the airport attack are not from Scotland, according to one police chief, who was applauded after he broke the news yesterday to a Muslim audience. Assistant Chief Constable John Neilson said: “The people we have in custody came to Scotland a short while ago to seek work. I am sure the community in Glasgow in particular will be reassured These are not your young people.”

Despite this news, prominent Muslims voiced their concern yesterday at a possible backlash against their community.

Osama Saeed, the Scottish spokesman for the Muslim Association of Great Britain, said that there was a general sense of despondency in the community at the damage the attack in Glasgow could cause. “Personally, I am seething with anger,” he said. “Thank God no lives were lost, but this kind of attack is aiming for indiscriminate slaughter.

“As a community not only are we just as likely to be victims as anyone else, but we are also looked to in order to provide direction and in some respects take responsibility for this. We are sick of being defined as a community by terrorism.”

By last night the climate of apprehension and high alert showed no signs of abating. Thousands of passengers were evacuated from Terminal 3 at Heathrow after the discovery of a suspicious black package. Travellers were advised to leave extra time to check in at the airport and to travel to airports by public transport if possible because forecourts are restricted and significant delays expected.



Trail of terror

Friday, June 29
1.25am Ambulance officers, called to treat a person injured in a Haymarket nightclub, notice smoke coming from a Mercedes outside and alert police

2am Police explosive experts defuse a bomb after finding the car packed with petrol, nails, gas cylinders and a detonator

2.30am A second Mercedes parked illegally on Cockspur Street, which runs between Haymarket and Trafalgar Square, is ticketed before being towed away to a car compound off Park Lane

1.40pm Home Secretary Jacqui Smith says the UK is “currently facing the most serious and sustained threat”

2pm Police close Park Lane to investigate the second Mercedes after parking attendants smell gas

9pm The Met say the Park Lane Mercedes contained similar explosives materials as the first car.

Saturday June 30
Noon Prime Minister Gordon Brown chairs a meeting of Cobra, the Government’s emergency contingencies committee.

3.15pm Two men ram a Cherokee Jeep into the main entrance at Glasgow’s airport. The vehicle crashes into the glass doors and bursts into flames before the two occupants are wrestled to the ground and arrested. One suspect, who suffered serious burns, is taken to hospital

8.15pm Britain raises security alert level to critical — the highest possible level

8.40pm In a televised address, Mr Brown urges the British people to be vigilant and support the emergency services

9.30pm William Rae, Chief Constable of Strathclyde, says the attack on Glasgow airport and the attempted car bombings in London are related

Sunday July 1
1am Police arrest two people in Cheshire, on the M6 near Sandbach, in connection with the attacks

12.50pm Merseyside Police confirm a man has been arrested in Liverpool near Lime Street Station. He is the fifth man arrested in connection with the attacks. Police later raid homes near Penny Lane

1.30pm Ms Smith announces that she will set out the Government’s response to the terrorist threat in Parliament

2.15pm Police carry out a controlled explosion of a car outside the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Paisley, where the injured driver was being treated

4pm Police confirm they are carrying out inquiries in Newcastle-under-Lyme, North Staffordshire

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article2013318.ece