Sunday Express : MI5 Foil Bombers By Cracking Email Code

MI5 FOIL BOMBERS BY CRACKING EMAIL CODE

By Brendan Abbott | August 15, 2009

MI5 believes it foiled an Al Qaeda attack in Britain after intercepting emails using “wedding” as code word for bomb, it was revealed yesterday.

Intelligence officers were convinced a series of ordinary-sounding messages actually referred to a planned terrorist strike around Easter, and that references to the bride “Nadia” was code for a vital component in an explosive device.

The emails were sent to one of 12 Pakistani men arrested in raids across the north-west of England in April.

None of the 12 was charged with any criminal offence but they remain in custody pending deportation to Pakistan. No explosives were found.

The emails were disclosed as Mr Justice Mitting – at the Special Immigration Appeals Commission – gave his reasons for refusing bail to five of the men at a hearing last month. There will be a full hearing later.

Mirror : Coded mail bar to bail

Coded mail bar to bail

August 15, 2009

SUSPECTS

Five men arrested in an anti-terror operation but never charged were refused bail because they exchanged coded emails, officials said yesterday.

Each has been in custody since they were picked up in a series of raids across the North-West in April.

The Government is trying to deport the men, all Pakistanis, who were refused bail last month.

No explosives were found but detainee Shoaib Khan, 27, is said to have emailed an al-Qaeda man with words "most likely" referring to terror acts.

Telegraph : Judge says 'al-Qaeda emails' could refer to bomb plot

Judge says 'al-Qaeda emails' could refer to bomb plot

By Duncan Gardham, Security Correspondent | August 14, 2009

Five Pakistani students have been denied bail after a judge decided they may have used coded emails about girls and cars to plan an Easter bombing campaign in Manchester.

The emails, disclosed by the Daily Telegraph last month, appear to use girl’s names to allude to bomb-making chemicals and a planned wedding as code for the attack.

Mr Justice Mitting, a high court judge, chairing the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC), said, “unless that assessment is clearly wrong we must, for present purposes, accept it.”

He said the commission had examined further evidence about the emails behind closed doors and was refusing bail until a full hearing next year.

The Government is trying to deport the students saying they are a risk to national security because they were members of a “UK-based network involved in terrorist operational activity in the UK, most likely attack planning.”

MI5 claims that the terrorist network was “co-ordinated” by a 23-year-old student who can only be referred to as “XC”, who sent and received the emails, and that it was “directed by al-Qaeda based overseas.”

They believe he was using girl’s names to allude to chemicals such as hydrogen peroxide and phrases such as “weak and difficult to convince” or “crystal clear” to the strengths of the chemicals available.

In one email the alleged commander in Pakistan referred to a “new car” which MI5 believed could refer to car bombs.

An email sent by XC on the afternoon of April 3 sparked fears that an attack was imminent when he said he had “agreed to conduct the nikah [wedding] after 15th and before 20th of this month” adding: “We will have many guests attending the party…I wished you could be here as well to enjoy the party.” It was this that led to police raids across the north west in which 11 men were arrested.

Four of the students attended one or both meetings with XC held on March 23 and April 1 this year when the “wedding” was allegedly discussed.

Mr Justice Mitting said the commission did not find MI5’s assessment of the meetings was “clearly wrong.”

Referring to the emails, he added: “On the information, open and closed, which we have now, we are not satisfied that the assessment by the Security Service of their likely meaning is clearly wrong.”

Robin Tam, QC for the government, said the emails were “central to the open case against the appellants” but Richard Hermer QC for XC told the commission that the assessment was far fetched and that when the emails were examined in the context of all the others stored on the hard drive of the man’s computer, they would be shown to be no more than innocent social discussions.

The commission said XC had submitted a “belated, as yet unsigned, statement” which made the same claim and suggested that the emails refer to “girls, though not by their own names, and that he hoped to marry in April 2009.”

All the appellants have pointed to the fact that no explosives were recovered and that there is nothing to link any of those arrested with explosives.

Of the 11 men initially arrested, eight are appealing against deportation on national security grounds, including XC, Abdul Wahab Khan, Shoaib Khan, Mohammed Ramzan, Ahmed Faraz Khan and Tariq ur-Rehman, who has returned to Pakistan voluntarily. Five had their application for bail turned down.

Two others, Janas Khan and Sultan Sher, have been bailed pending deportation for visa irregularities although the government still maintains they were “involved in an extreme Islamist network.”

A British man, Hamza Shinwari, was released without charge.

The three unnamed men, including XC, have declined to waive their anonymity under the rules that govern SIAC.

Reuters : Pakistani suspects refused UK bail due coded email

Pakistani suspects refused UK bail due coded email

August 14, 2009

LONDON (Reuters) - Five Pakistani men arrested in a British anti-terrorism operation but never charged have been refused bail because they had exchanged a series of coded emails, officials said.

The five were among 12 men, mostly students, arrested in high profile counter-terrorism raids across northwest England in April but never formally charged with any criminal offence because of insufficent evidence.

They are being detained while the government tries to deport them and were refused bail at their hearing last month, the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC), which deals with such cases, revealed on Friday.

A series of seven emails exchanged between Shoaib Khan, 27, and an associate alleged to be an al Qaeda operative detailed a 'nikah' or wedding which the British Security Service said "most likely" referred to an intended attack.

The emails also included girls' names such as 'Nadia' which might refer to ingredients used in an explosive device, the ruling said.

Khan's lawyer said the emails referred to girls, though not by their own names, that Khan hoped to marry in April 2009. Final interpretation of the emails will be addressed at a hearing next year.

The five Pakistanis, who will remain in custody until that hearing, have not been linked to anyone arrested with explosives, and no explosives have been found, SIAC said.

Several hundred officers took part in the raids, which had to be hurriedly brought forward after Britain's most senior counter-terrorism officer was photographed openly carrying a secret document detailing plans for the arrests.

Britain has demanded Pakistan do more to combat terrorism. Most terrorist plots in Britain since Sept. 11, 2001 have had links to Pakistan, including suicide bombings in July 2005 which killed 52 people on London's underground and bus network.

Pakistan criticised Britain over the April arrests, saying more could have been done to check the background of foreign students.

(Reporting by Farah Master, editing by Tim Pearce)

© Thomson Reuters 2009 All rights reserved

Guardian : Britain downgrades al-Qaida terror attack alert level

Britain downgrades al-Qaida terror attack alert level

Officials reduce assessment of threat from 'severe' to 'substantial', its lowest level since 9/11

Alan Travis, home affairs editor | July 20, 2009

The official assessment of the threat level of an al-Qaida terrorist attack on Britain has been lowered from "severe" – where an attack is deemed highly likely – to "substantial", where an attack is considered a strong possibility.

The decision to lower the official threat level follows a new assessment by MI5 and the joint terrorism analysis centre, based on intelligence gathered in Britain and abroad on how close terrorist groups may be to staging an attack.

The designation of a "substantial" threat level is the lowest since 9/11. It confirms that the swine flu pandemic is now a bigger threat to the life of the nation than terrorism.

The home secretary, Alan Johnson, acknowledged that fact on Sunday, when he told the BBC's Andrew Marr programme that swine flu came "above terrorism as a threat to this country". He said the long-term preparations had involved the whole "Cobra machinery", a reference to the Cabinet's emergency committe that handles major disasters.

The decision reportedly follows an official assessment of Operation Pathway, one of MI5's biggest counterterrorism campaigns, which led to the arrest of 11 Pakistani men in April. All those arrested were released without charge, and no explosives or weapons were found.

The system of threat levels is made up of five stages. At "critical", an attack is expected imminently. At "severe", an attack is regarded as highly likely. At "substantial", an attack is a strong possibility. At "moderate" an attack is possible but not likely. And at "low", an attack is deemed unlikely.

The home secretary said in a statement: "We still face a real and serious threat from terrorists and the public will notice little difference in the security measures that are in place, and I urge the public to remain vigilant. The police and security services are continuing in their thorough efforts to discover, track and disrupt terrorist activity."

Times : Terrorist threat lowest since 9/11

Terrorist threat lowest since 9/11

David Leppard | The Sunday Times | July 19, 2009

THE threat of an Al-Qaeda attack on Britain is lower than at any time since before the 9/11 attacks, MI5 has privately concluded.

Well-placed officials said there had been discussions in MI5 over the past month about whether to reduce the terrorist threat level from “severe” – where an attack is deemed highly likely – to “substantial”, where it is “a strong possibility”.

The assessment follows Operation Pathway, one of MI5’s biggest counterterrorist campaigns. It led to the arrest of 11 Pakistani men in April.

The men were released without charge. When no explosives or weapons were found, critics said the operation revealed the absence of any terrorist plot against the UK.

Although MI5 declined to comment, evidence of the perceived lower risk came last week when the US navy moored a warship, the Halyburton, in London.

“The Americans wouldn’t dream of [it] if the threat of an attack was high,” a security official said.

Police One : Disruption vs. prosecution and the Manchester plot

Terrorism Prevention and Response Article: Disruption vs. prosecution and the Manchester plot

By Fred Burton and Scott Stewart | | April 26, 2009

On April 8, British authorities mounted a series of raids in Merseyside, Manchester and Lancashire that resulted in the arrest of 12 men suspected of being involved in a plot to conduct attacks over the Easter holiday weekend. In a press conference the following day, Prime Minister Gordon Brown noted that the men arrested were allegedly involved in “a very big terrorist plot.” British authorities have alleged that those arrested sought to conduct suicide bombing attacks against a list of soft targets that included shopping centers, a train station and a nightclub.

The searches and arrests targeting the suspects purportedly involved in the plot, which was dubbed Operation Pathway, had to be accelerated after Bob Quick, the assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan Police in charge of terrorism investigations, inadvertently allowed reporters to see a classified document pertaining to the operation as he was entering 10 Downing Street to brief Brown and Home Secretary Jacqui Smith on April 8. An embarrassed Quick resigned April 9 over the gaffe.

In spite of the leak, the British authorities were successful in detaining all of the targeted suspects, though the authorities have reportedly not been able to recover explosive material or other bomb-making evidence they were seeking. British authorities arrested 12 suspects, 11 of whom were Pakistani citizens. Smith told British Parliament on April 20 that all 11 of the Pakistani nationals entered the United Kingdom on student visas. The youngest of the Pakistani suspects, who is reportedly still a teenager, was remanded to the custody of British immigration authorities to face deportation proceedings April 9. The rest of the 11 suspects were released by British authorities April 21, though ten reportedly were placed in the custody of immigration officials.

Many of the specific details of the plot have not yet come out, and due to the sensitive nature of the intelligence sources and methods involved in these types of investigations, more details may never be fully divulged now that there will be no criminal trial. However, when viewed in the historical and tactical context of other terror plots and attacks (in the United Kingdom and elsewhere), there are some very interesting conclusions that can be drawn from this series of events and the few facts that have been released to the public so far.

This case also highlights the tension that exists within the counterterrorism community between advocates of strategies to disrupt terrorist attacks and those who want to ensure that terror suspects can be convicted in a court of law.

Targets

Among of the most significant things that have come to light so far regarding the thwarted plot are the alleged targets. According to press reports, the British MI5 surveillance teams assigned to monitor the activities of the purported plotters observed some of them videotaping themselves outside of the Arndale and Trafford shopping centers in Manchester, as well as at St. Ann’s Square, which lies in the center of Manchester’s main shopping district. Other reports suggest that the plotters had also conducted surveillance of Manchester’s Piccadilly train station, an intercity train station that is one of the busiest in the United Kingdom outside London, and Manchester’s Birdcage nightclub.

These targets are significant for several reasons. First, they are all soft targets — that is, targets with very little security. As STRATFOR has pointed out for several years now, since counterterrorism efforts have been stepped up in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, and as the tactical capability of groups like al Qaeda has been degraded, jihadist operatives have had less success targeting hardened targets and have turned instead to striking soft targets.

While authorities have moved to protect high-value targets, there simply are far too many potential targets to protect them all. Governments are stretched thin just trying to protect important government buildings, bridges, dams, nuclear power plants, airports and mass-transit systems in their jurisdiction. The reality on the ground is that there are not nearly enough resources to protect them all, much less every potential location where people concentrate in large groups — like shopping centers and nightclubs. This means that some targets are unprotected and are therefore, by definition, soft.

The selection of soft targets in this case indicates that the alleged Manchester plotters did not possess the operational capability to strike more strategic, high-value targets. While attacks against soft targets can be tragic and quite bloody, they will not have the same effect as a successful attack on high-value targets such as Parliament, the London Stock Exchange or a nuclear power station.

It is also very interesting that the plotters were purportedly looking to hit soft targets in Manchester and not soft targets in London. London, as the capital and a city that has been the center of several plots and attacks, is generally on a higher alert than the rest of the country and therefore would likely be seen as more difficult to target. Additionally, many of the suspects lived in the Manchester area, and as we have previously discussed, grassroots operatives, who are not as well-trained as their transnational brethren, tend to “think globally and act locally,” meaning that they tend to plan their attacks in familiar places where they are comfortable operating, rather than in strange and potentially more hostile environment.

In addition to targeting locations like shopping centers and the train station, where there were expected to be large crowds over the holiday weekend, the alleged plotters also apparently looked at the Birdcage nightclub, an establishment that is famous for its “flamboyant and spectacular” shows featuring female impersonators. This is a location the alleged plotters likely considered a symbol of Western decadence (like establishments that serve alcohol in Muslim countries).

Flawed Tradecraft

As noted above, the alleged plotters had been under surveillance by MI5. This indicates that their operational security had been compromised, either via human or technical means. Furthermore, the suspects did not appear to possess any surveillance detection capability — or even much situational awareness — as they went out into Manchester to conduct pre-operational surveillance of potential targets while under government surveillance themselves. Furthermore, the suspects’ surveillance techniques appear to have been very rudimentary in that they lacked both cover for action and cover for status while conducting their surveillance operations.

This aspect of the investigation reinforces two very important points that STRATFOR has been making for some time now. First, most militant groups do not provide very good surveillance training and as a result, poor surveillance tradecraft has long proven to be an Achilles’ heel for militants. Second, because of this weakness, countersurveillance operations can be very effective at catching militant operatives when they are most vulnerable — during the surveillance phase of the terrorist attack cycle.

Media reports indicated that during Operation Pathway, British authorities intercepted a series of Internet exchanges between the suspects suggesting a terror strike was imminent. Furthermore, among the locations raided April 8 was the Cyber Net Cafe in Cheetham Hill, an establishment where British authorities observed the suspects using computers to communicate. Not only is this electronic surveillance significant in that it allowed the authorities to surmise the approximate timing of the attack, but perhaps just as important, this ability to monitor the suspects’ communications will allow the authorities to identify other militants in the United Kingdom and beyond.

Indeed, in several previous cases related to the United Kingdom, such as the investigations involving the U.S. arrest of Mohammed Junaid Babar and the U.K. arrest of Younis Tsouli, authorities were able to use communications from militant suspects to identify and roll up militant cells in other countries. Therefore, we will not be at all surprised to hear at some point in the future that British authorities were able use the communications of the recently arrested suspects to tip off authorities in the United States, Canada, other European countries or elsewhere about the militant activities of people the suspects were in contact with.

Links to Pakistan

And speaking of elsewhere, as noted above, 11 of the arrested suspects were Pakistani nationals who entered the U.K. on student visas. At this point it is not exactly clear if the British believe the 11 suspects were radical militants specifically sent to the United Kingdom to conduct attacks or if they arrived without malicious intent and were then radicalized in the Petri dish of Islamist extremism that so rapidly replicates inside the British Muslim community — what we have come to refer to as Londonistan.

Many British lawmakers and media reports have made a huge issue out of the fact that 11 of the alleged plotters entered the United Kingdom on student visas, but even if the suspects were radicals who used student visas as a way to enter the United Kingdom, this is by no means a new tactic as some are reporting. STRATFOR has long discussed the use of student visas, bogus political asylum claims and other forms of immigration fraud that have commonly been used by militants. In fact, there have been numerous prior examples of jihadist operatives using student visas, such as the following:

* While Sept. 11 hijackers Mohamed Atta and Marwan al-Shehhi initially entered the United States on tourist visas, they were approved for M-1 student visas shortly before carrying out their attacks.

* Youssef Samir Megahed, who was arrested in possession of an improvised explosive device (IED) in August 2007 and later sentenced to a 15-year prison sentence, was a Kuwaiti engineering student who entered the United States on a student visa.

* Mohammed Aatique, a convicted member of the “Virginia Jihad Network” who was sentenced to 10 years in prison for conspiracy and weapons violations, also entered the United States from Pakistan as an engineering student.

In some ways, connections between the alleged plotters and militant groups in Pakistan such as al Qaeda or the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) would be more analytically significant than if they turn out to be grassroots operatives. The operational security, skills and terrorist tradecraft exhibited by the plotters are about what one would expect to see in a grassroots militant organization. This level of sophistication is, however, far less than one would expect from a transnational organization. Therefore, if this was an al Qaeda operation, it shows how far the group has fallen in the past eight years. If it was the TTP, it means that our previous estimate of their operational ability outside of Pakistan was fairly accurate.

Lack of Evidence

To date, the British authorities have not been able to find the explosive material and IED components they were expecting to find. This might mean that the materials may still be hidden somewhere and could be used in a future attack. It is also quite possible, and perhaps more likely, that this lack of evidence is an indication that the plot was not quite as far along as the British authorities believed. Perhaps the references the suspects allegedly made to launching the attack on a bank holiday pertained to a holiday later in the year.

While the plot as described by the British authorities would not have been a significant, strategic threat to the United Kingdom, it could have been quite deadly and could very well have surpassed the July 7, 2005, attacks in terms of final body count. Because of this potential destruction, it is quite possible that the British government decided to err on the side of disruption rather than on the side of prosecution. This is something we have seen in the investigation of several other plots in recent years in the United Kingdom and elsewhere, perhaps most notably in the August 2006 Heathrow plot, in which a cell of operatives was preparing to bomb a series of trans-Atlantic airline flights using liquid explosives.

It is much more difficult to obtain a conviction for a conspiracy to commit an act of terrorism than it is to obtain a conviction for an attack that was successfully conducted. Once the attack is executed, there is no longer much room to wrangle in court over things such as intent or capability. Governments also frequently know things via intelligence they cannot prove to the standards required for a conviction in a court of law.

This was seen in the Heathrow case, where only three of the eight suspects were convicted of the main charges during that trial, which ended in September 2008. (The other five suspects had pled guilty to lesser charges.) During that case there was reportedly some tension between the U.S. and British authorities over when to wrap up the Heathrow plotters — some of the British apparently wanted to wait a while longer to secure more damning evidence, while the Americans were reportedly more interested in ensuring that the plot was disrupted than they were in obtaining convictions. It is likely the same dynamic was at play during the investigation of the Manchester case.

Although Quick’s disclosure did hasten the launch of Operation Pathway by a few hours, it did not significantly alter the timing of the investigation — the British authorities were preparing to execute an array of searches and arrests. From an ethical standpoint (and, not insignificantly in this day and age, a political aspect) it is deemed better by many to disrupt a plot early and risk the terror suspects being acquitted than it is to accidentally allow them to conduct an attack while waiting to gather the evidence required for an ironclad court case. Disruption can have an impact on the success of prosecutions, but in the eyes of a growing number of policymakers, that impact is offset by the lives it saves.

~~~~

Fred Burton is one of the world’s foremost authorities on security, terrorists and terrorist organizations. In his capacity as Vice President for Counterterrorism and Corporate Security, Mr. Burton oversees Stratfor’s terrorism intelligence service and consults with clients on security-related issues affecting their organizations or personal safety. He leads a team of terrorism experts and a global network of human intelligence sources to analyze and forecast the most significant events and trends related to terrorism and counterterrorism. Before joining Stratfor, Mr. Burton served as a special agent in counterterrorism for the U.S. Department of State, where he was involved in many high-profile operations. He orchestrated the arrest of Ramzi Yousef, mastermind of the first World Trade Center bombing, and investigated cases such as the assassination of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, the killing of Rabbi Meir Kahane, al Qaeda’s New York City bombing plots before 9/11, and the Libyan-backed terrorist attacks against diplomats in Sanaa and Khartoum. He has also served as the U.S. liaison officer to several international security, intelligence and law enforcement agencies, providing consulting on global intelligence and threat identification. In addition, Mr. Burton has revolutionized the field of security by designing a unique and specialized protective program to safeguard CEOs, their families, employees and physical facilities. His strategy is highly valued and has been implemented by governments and a number of the world’s leading corporations. For a special offer to get a copy of GHOST, and to read additional information about Fred Burton and his role at Stratfor, please click here

Independent : Police and PM in dock over arrest of terrorist suspects

Police and PM in dock over arrest of terrorist suspects

Case against Muslim men amounted to one email and handful of telephone conversations

By Jonathan Brown, Robert Verkaik and Kim Sengupta | April 23, 2009

The case against 12 Muslim men involved in what Gordon Brown described as a "major terrorist plot" amounted to one email and a handful of ambiguous telephone conversations, it emerged last night after all the men were released without charge.

Eleven Pakistani students and one British man were freed after extensive searches of 14 addresses in North-west England failed to locate evidence of terrorist activity, according to security sources. Police did not find any explosives, firearms, target lists, documents or any material which could have been used to carry out an attack.

Last night Lord Carlile, the reviewer of terror laws, said he would be heading an immediate "snapshot" investigation into the arrests.

The Home Office said it would deport the 11 Pakistani men, who are aged 22 to 38 and were in Britain on student visas, because the Government believed they represented a threat to national security.

According to security sources, the operation was launched after the interception of telephone calls and emails which pointed towards a bombing campaign orchestrated by al-Qa'ida. But yesterday a senior Pakistani defence official said the British authorities had failed to consult them adequately before carrying out the arrests and greater co-operation would have avoided "embarrassing mistakes" for the British Government.

The official said: "They really started asking for our help properly after the arrests had been made over here. We have not arrested anyone in Pakistan, the families of these men or their friends, because we could not find anything against them, and we have a big file on terrorist suspects."

It has also emerged that there were disagreements among the various British security agencies about the way aspects of the operation were conducted.

Muslim groups and lawyers for the 12 men arrested two weeks ago in connection with the alleged terror attack plot on the North-west said the police operation had been a fiasco from start to finish.

The only British man questioned for 13 days in connection with the alleged plot may have been held on the strength of a single "cryptic" email, it emerged last night.

Lawyers for Hamzah Khan Shenwari, a 42-year-old security guard and delivery driver from Cheetham Hill, Manchester, disclosed that he had entered Britain nine years ago and was granted political asylum following his treatment at the hands of the Taliban. The Pashtu-speaker, who comes from the North West Province of Pakistan, where his family and children still live, was questioned over the course of 14 hours at a police station in Coventry although no substantial evidence was put before him, it was claimed. He claims he suffered bruises and a cracked rib during his arrest. Police believed that he was the "teacher" of the group because he was the oldest, his lawyers said.

His solicitor, Sawar Khan, said: "He was elated this morning but his words to me were 'it is going to be difficult for me'. Even though he has been released without charge how will he be treated now? Most of the men come from north-west Pakistan but where they come from or what faith they are should not be a deciding factor in anything."

Lawyers for the men are furious that Gordon Brown and the Home Secretary made statements on the alleged plot during their detention period. Mr Khan said it was regrettable that, even though his client had been released, the Chief Constable of Greater Manchester Police had again talked up the threat of an unspecified terrorist attack.

He said there were question marks over the initial detention period of his client between 8 and 14 April. He was eventually released after Mr Justice Blake, who heard the application for a third extension of custody via a video link in the High Court, expressed "grave concern" over the progress of the investigation.

Mr Khan said Mr Shenwari was not seeking publicity or money. Police appeared to have few definite facts during the course of the questioning, it was claimed and no surveillance evidence was put to him. "A lot of the questions were repeated – he was asked whether he was involved in the preparation or instigation of terrorism."

Mr Shenwari, who does not own a computer, was asked by police about an email sent by one of the arrested men although the contents of the message were never made available to his defence team. It is understood that the email was cryptic and open to misinterpretation if taken out of context.

Mohammed Ayub said he would consider lodging an appeal for asylum on behalf of his clients, Sultan Sher, Mohammed Rizwan Sharif and Mohammed Umer Farooq, who were held at a police station in Bradford where they underwent up to six hours of questioning a day.

Mr Ayub said his clients, who all came from the North West Frontier territories of Pakistan, faced serious dangers should they be returned to their homeland.

"They face an uncertain future in Pakistan now they have been labelled as being engaged in potential terrorist activity," he said. "They cannot go back to living normal lives in Pakistan. The authorities may be obliged to put them into custody where they may be subjected to torture," he said.

"They were sustained by the belief that they were not involved in any wrongdoing and they maintained their innocence throughout. What put the police on to them in the first place? That is a very difficult question," he said.

During the interviews, Mr Ayub said no specific evidence had been put to his clients – no video footage or surveillance photographs were shown to them, though they were asked directly whether they were members of al-Qa'ida. Last night, 10 of the men were being held at detention centres. Their lawyers have seven days to present their cases to an appeals panel.

~~~

The North-west arrests: Key questions

When were the men arrested?

Manchester police officers were rushed into making the arrests after Bob Quick, then Britain's senior counter-terrorism officer, accidentally displayed information prejudicing the operation. Officers raided homes and universities across the North-west of England on 8 April. Twelve men were arrested under the Terrorism Act 2000. Mr Quick later resigned.

How long were they held?

One was released to the UK Borders Agency while the remaining 11 were questioned by police. Under terror laws suspects can be held without charge for up to 28 days. By yesterday all 12 had been released, two weeks before the maximum time limit expired.

Why didn't the police keep the men in custody longer?

The Terrorism Act includes judicial safeguards to ensure that the police are not simply detaining people while conducting "fishing expeditions" for evidence. The first time the police sought judicial permission was after 48 hours of detention. But they had to go back to court to authorise detention every week. After 14 days' detention the Crown Prosecution Service asked further permission from a High Court judge to keep the men in custody. It is understood that at this point the judge expressed concerns about the quality of the evidence being used to justify their detention. The investigation had clearly made little progress and the men were released.

What did the judge have to decide?

The court must be satisfied that there are reasonable grounds for believing that further detention will help obtain or preserve relevant evidence. But the judge must also be happy that the investigation is being conducted "diligently and expediently".

What happens next?

The Home Office says it will deport the 11 Pakistanis on grounds of national security. It is understood that the men want to carry on their studies in the UK and their lawyers are expected to go to court to contest this action.

Who will win?

It's hard to say. The Home Office must show that the men's presence in the UK is not conducive to the public good or that they represent a threat to national security. Their lawyers will argue that no evidence has been provided to support such a claim. The case is expected to end up before the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (Siac) which can hear evidence in secret.

What are they likely to say?

In the past Siac has blocked deportations to countries where the suspects face possible torture or execution. Now that the 11 students have been arrested on suspicion of what Gordon Brown described as a "major terrorism plot" they will almost certainly be of interest to the Pakistan security forces.

So what threat do they face upon their return?

The Pakistan police and security forces are known to have tortured terror suspects, some of whom are British citizens. Pakistan also retains the death penalty. Now that the names of the students are known to the Islamabad authorities the men may wish to pursue claims for asylum in the UK on humanitarian grounds.

How long will this case take?

It could go on for years. Several Algerians are still being held in the UK five years after they were accused of links to terrorism. It has taken that long for the House of Lords to rule that they can be safely deported.

Robert Verkaik

Frontier India : Disruption vs. Prosecution and the Manchester Plot

Disruption vs. Prosecution and the Manchester Plot

By Fred Burton and Scott Stewart, STRATFOR | April 22, 2009

On April 8, British authorities mounted a series of raids in Merseyside, Manchester and Lancashire that resulted in the arrest of 12 men suspected of being involved in a plot to conduct attacks over the Easter holiday weekend. In a press conference the following day, Prime Minister Gordon Brown noted that the men arrested were allegedly involved in “a very big terrorist plot.” British authorities have alleged that those arrested sought to conduct suicide bombing attacks against a list of soft targets that included shopping centers, a train station and a nightclub.

The searches and arrests targeting the suspects purportedly involved in the plot, which was dubbed Operation Pathway, had to be accelerated after Bob Quick, the assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan Police in charge of terrorism investigations, inadvertently allowed reporters to see a classified document pertaining to the operation as he was entering 10 Downing Street to brief Brown and Home Secretary Jacqui Smith on April 8. An embarrassed Quick resigned April 9 over the gaffe.

In spite of the leak, the British authorities were successful in detaining all of the targeted suspects, though the authorities have reportedly not been able to recover explosive material or other bomb-making evidence they were seeking. British authorities arrested 12 suspects, 11 of whom were Pakistani citizens. Smith told British Parliament on April 20 that all 11 of the Pakistani nationals entered the United Kingdom on student visas. The youngest of the Pakistani suspects, who is reportedly still a teenager, was remanded to the custody of British immigration authorities to face deportation proceedings April 9. The rest of the 11 suspects were released by British authorities April 21, though ten reportedly were placed in the custody of immigration officials.

Many of the specific details of the plot have not yet come out, and due to the sensitive nature of the intelligence sources and methods involved in these types of investigations, more details may never be fully divulged now that there will be no criminal trial. However, when viewed in the historical and tactical context of other terror plots and attacks (in the United Kingdom and elsewhere), there are some very interesting conclusions that can be drawn from this series of events and the few facts that have been released to the public so far.

This case also highlights the tension that exists within the counterterrorism community between advocates of strategies to disrupt terrorist attacks and those who want to ensure that terror suspects can be convicted in a court of law.

Targets

Among of the most significant things that have come to light so far regarding the thwarted plot are the alleged targets. According to press reports, the British MI5 surveillance teams assigned to monitor the activities of the purported plotters observed some of them videotaping themselves outside of the Arndale and Trafford shopping centers in Manchester, as well as at St. Ann’s Square, which lies in the center of Manchester’s main shopping district. Other reports suggest that the plotters had also conducted surveillance of Manchester’s Piccadilly train station, an intercity train station that is one of the busiest in the United Kingdom outside London, and Manchester’s Birdcage nightclub.

These targets are significant for several reasons. First, they are all soft targets — that is, targets with very little security. As STRATFOR has pointed out for several years now, since counterterrorism efforts have been stepped up in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, and as the tactical capability of groups like al Qaeda has been degraded, jihadist operatives have had less success targeting hardened targets and have turned instead to striking soft targets.

While authorities have moved to protect high-value targets, there simply are far too many potential targets to protect them all. Governments are stretched thin just trying to protect important government buildings, bridges, dams, nuclear power plants, airports and mass-transit systems in their jurisdiction. The reality on the ground is that there are not nearly enough resources to protect them all, much less every potential location where people concentrate in large groups — like shopping centers and nightclubs. This means that some targets are unprotected and are therefore, by definition, soft.

The selection of soft targets in this case indicates that the alleged Manchester plotters did not possess the operational capability to strike more strategic, high-value targets. While attacks against soft targets can be tragic and quite bloody, they will not have the same effect as a successful attack on high-value targets such as Parliament, the London Stock Exchange or a nuclear power station.

It is also very interesting that the plotters were purportedly looking to hit soft targets in Manchester and not soft targets in London. London, as the capital and a city that has been the center of several plots and attacks, is generally on a higher alert than the rest of the country and therefore would likely be seen as more difficult to target. Additionally, many of the suspects lived in the Manchester area, and as we have previously discussed, grassroots operatives, who are not as well-trained as their transnational brethren, tend to “think globally and act locally,” meaning that they tend to plan their attacks in familiar places where they are comfortable operating, rather than in strange and potentially more hostile environment.

In addition to targeting locations like shopping centers and the train station, where there were expected to be large crowds over the holiday weekend, the alleged plotters also apparently looked at the Birdcage nightclub, an establishment that is famous for its “flamboyant and spectacular” shows featuring female impersonators. This is a location the alleged plotters likely considered a symbol of Western decadence (like establishments that serve alcohol in Muslim countries).

Flawed Tradecraft

As noted above, the alleged plotters had been under surveillance by MI5. This indicates that their operational security had been compromised, either via human or technical means. Furthermore, the suspects did not appear to possess any surveillance detection capability — or even much situational awareness — as they went out into Manchester to conduct pre-operational surveillance of potential targets while under government surveillance themselves. Furthermore, the suspects’ surveillance techniques appear to have been very rudimentary in that they lacked both cover for action and cover for status while conducting their surveillance operations.

This aspect of the investigation reinforces two very important points that STRATFOR has been making for some time now. First, most militant groups do not provide very good surveillance training and as a result, poor surveillance tradecraft has long proven to be an Achilles’ heel for militants. Second, because of this weakness, countersurveillance operations can be very effective at catching militant operatives when they are most vulnerable — during the surveillance phase of the terrorist attack cycle.

Media reports indicated that during Operation Pathway, British authorities intercepted a series of Internet exchanges between the suspects suggested a terror strike was imminent. Furthermore, among the locations raided April 8 was the Cyber Net Cafe in Cheetham Hill, an establishment where British authorities observed the suspects using computers to communicate. Not only is this electronic surveillance significant in that it allowed the authorities to surmise the approximate timing of the attack, but perhaps just as important, this ability to monitor the suspects’ communications will allow the authorities to identify other militants in the United Kingdom and beyond.

Indeed, in several previous cases related to the United Kingdom, such as the investigations involving the U.S. arrest of Mohammed Junaid Babar and the U.K. arrest of Younis Tsouli, authorities were able to use communications from militant suspects to identify and roll up militant cells in other countries. Therefore, we will not be at all surprised to hear at some point in the future that British authorities were be able use the communications of the recently arrested suspects to tip off authorities in the United States, Canada, other European countries or elsewhere about the militant activities of people the suspects were in contact with.

Links to Pakistan

And speaking of elsewhere, as noted above, 11 of the arrested suspects were Pakistani nationals who entered the U.K. on student visas. At this point it is not exactly clear if the British believe the 11 suspects were radical militants specifically sent to the United Kingdom to conduct attacks or if they arrived without malicious intent and were then radicalized in the Petri dish of Islamist extremism that so rapidly replicates inside the British Muslim community — what we have come to refer to as Londonistan.

Many British lawmakers and media reports have made a huge issue out of the fact that 11 of the alleged plotters entered the United Kingdom on student visas, but even if the suspects were radicals who used student visas as a way to enter the United Kingdom, this is by no means a new tactic as some are reporting. STRATFOR has long discussed the use of student visas, bogus political asylum claims and other forms of immigration fraud that have commonly been used by militants. In fact, there have been numerous prior examples of jihadist operatives using student visas, such as the following:

* While Sept. 11 hijackers Mohamed Atta and Marwan al-Shehhi initially entered the United States on tourist visas, they were approved for M-1 student visas shortly before carrying out their attacks.

* Youssef Samir Megahed, who was arrested in possession of an improvised explosive device (IED) in August 2007 and later sentenced to a 15-year prison sentence, was a Kuwaiti engineering student who entered the United States on a student visa.

* Mohammed Aatique, a convicted member of the “Virginia Jihad Network” who was sentenced to 10 years in prison for conspiracy and weapons violations, also entered the United States from Pakistan as an engineering student.

In some ways, connections between the alleged plotters and militant groups in Pakistan such as al Qaeda or the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) would be more analytically significant than if they turn out to be grassroots operatives. The operational security, skills and terrorist tradecraft exhibited by the plotters are about what one would expect to see in a grassroots militant organization. This level of sophistication is, however, far less than one would expect from a transnational organization. Therefore, if this was an al Qaeda operation, it shows how far the group has fallen in the past eight years. If it was the TTP, it means that our previous estimate of their operational ability outside of Pakistan was fairly accurate.

Lack of Evidence

To date, the British authorities have not been able to find the explosive material and IED components they were expecting to find. This might mean that the materials may still be hidden somewhere and could be used in a future attack. It is also quite possible, and perhaps more likely, that this lack of evidence is an indication that the plot was not quite as far along as the British authorities believed. Perhaps the references the suspects allegedly made to launching the attack on a bank holiday pertained to a holiday later in the year.

While the plot as described by the British authorities would not have been a significant, strategic threat to the United Kingdom, it could have been quite deadly and could very well have surpassed the July 7, 2005, attacks in terms of final body count. Because of this potential destruction, it is quite possible that the British government decided to err on the side of disruption rather than on the side of prosecution. This is something we have seen in the investigation of several other plots in recent years in the United Kingdom and elsewhere, perhaps most notably in the August 2006 Heathrow plot, in which a cell of operatives was preparing to bomb a series of trans-Atlantic airline flights using liquid explosives.

It is much more difficult to obtain a conviction for a conspiracy to commit an act of terrorism than it is to obtain a conviction for an attack that was successfully conducted. Once the attack is executed, there is no longer much room to wrangle in court over things such as intent or capability. Governments also frequently know things via intelligence they cannot prove to the standards required for a conviction in a court of law.

This was seen in the Heathrow case, where only three of the eight suspects were convicted of the main charges during that trial, which ended in September 2008. (The other five suspects had pled guilty to lesser charges.) During that case there was reportedly some tension between the U.S. and British authorities over when to wrap up the Heathrow plotters — some of the British apparently wanted to wait a while longer to secure more damning evidence, while the Americans were reportedly more interested in ensuring that the plot was disrupted than they were in obtaining convictions. It is likely the same dynamic was at play during the investigation of the Manchester case.

Although Quick’s disclosure did hasten the launch of Operation Pathway by a few hours, it did not significantly alter the timing of the investigation — the British authorities were preparing to execute an array of searches and arrests. From an ethical standpoint (and, not insignificantly in this day and age, a political aspect) it is deemed better by many to disrupt a plot early and risk the terror suspects being acquitted than it is to accidentally allow them to conduct an attack while waiting to gather the evidence required for an ironclad court case. Disruption can have an impact on the success of prosecutions, but in the eyes of a growing number of policymakers, that impact is offset by the lives it saves.

WSWS : The “anti-terror” arrests in northwest England: what really lies behind them?

The “anti-terror” arrests in northwest England: what really lies behind them?

By Julie Hyland | April 15, 2009

One week after a series of high profile arrests, little evidence has come to light of plans for the mass terrorist atrocity that supposedly triggered the detentions.

Eleven of the 12 people rounded up on April 8—all males aged between 18 and 42 years of age—remain in custody. Under Britain’s draconian anti-terror laws terror suspects can be held for up to 28 days without charge. An 18-year-old youth, one of the 11 Pakistani nationals held, was released at the weekend, but handed over to immigration officials.

Security sources have stated that they expect few, if any, terror-related charges to result from the arrests. Raids on homes and premises in the northwest of England have so far failed to turn up any evidence of bombs, chemical explosives, weapons or ammunition. One senior security source was cited in the Guardian as stating that “nothing of huge significance” had been uncovered.

This is a far cry from the hysterical claims that originally attended the arrests. Then police sources claimed that they had thwarted a massive Al Qaeda-directed operation to launch large-scale suicide bomb attacks over the Easter holiday.

Citing information from MI6 operations targeted on Pakistan, anonymous security officials claimed there had been a high risk of an “imminent attack” that would cause “mass casualties.” Prime Minister Gordon Brown described the apparent terror plot as “very big.”

Such is the subsequent backpedalling over the alleged terrorist conspiracy that the Guardian stated, “A central mystery remains how counterterrorism officials could believe such a serious plot existed when they were unsure of seemingly basic elements of the alleged conspiracy, such as the targets.”

Indeed. The “evidence” now being presented for the existence of a terror threat appears to centre on reports that several of those detained—most of whom were in the UK on student visas—had been seen taking photographs near a Manchester shopping centre and other public venues. This behaviour, it is argued, is consistent with terrorist reconnaissance. A surveillance team also reportedly heard discussions about certain dates over the Easter holiday, prompting the arrests.

But relatives and neighbours have refuted such claims. The majority of those arrested were students living in some of the poorest areas of Merseyside. One neighbour described how several of those detained had recently staged an impromptu street celebration during heavy snowfall, playing Hindi music, dancing and encouraging others to join in. “I never had suspicions about them,” she said. “They were jolly guys, not aggressive and never any trouble.”

The father of one of those held, speaking to the media from his home in Peshawar, said his son was in his third year of computer studies in Manchester, on a visa valid until next September. “We have done nothing wrong. We have nothing to hide,” the father stated, calling offensive the lurid press accounts of his son’s alleged terror-related activities.

The uncle of another man told the Guardian that the family regularly made financial contributions to help his nephew fund his education. “He was too ambitious about his life and his studies. He was not up to any mischief. So I say to the UK government, please don’t spoil his future,” he pleaded.

Sweeping police powers

It is not the first time that warnings of an imminent terrorist catastrophe, accompanied by mass arrests, have failed to live up to their claims.

In the years since 9/11 more than 1,000 people have been arrested under anti-terrorism laws, of which less than 50 have been convicted.

So sweeping are the anti-terrorism powers that people have been detained on the flimsiest of pretexts. Earlier this month, five people in Plymouth were detained under the Terrorism Act after a young man was seen spraying graffiti. “Political literature” was reportedly found in one of the homes raided and it was claimed at the time that the five had been planning to join the G20 protests in London. Held for several days, they were all released without charge.

All the while, the hysterical atmosphere generated by such arrests has been used to further strengthen police powers and undermine democratic rights. The brutal shooting of innocent Brazilian Jean Charles de Menezes in July 2005 by undercover anti-terrorist officers exposed that police had covertly adopted a shoot-to-kill policy. Less than one year later another innocent man, Mohammed Abdul Kahar, was shot by anti-terror police in a raid on his home.

In the latest sweep, Muhammad Adil, a 27-year-old Pakistani student, told how he had been eating lunch outside Liverpool John Moores University when he and a friend were surrounded by armed officers.

Special forces with telescopic machine guns instructed them to raise their hands, and forced them to the floor. Adil’s hands were tied behind his back as he lay on the ground for one hour, while police kept their guns trained on him. Taken to a police station, he was released after several hours without charge.

Simultaneously, police were carrying out similarly spectacular arrests in other locations, starting at the 5 p.m. rush-hour.

Two people were detained while working as security guards at a DIY store. A worker at the store told how 80 officers had swooped on the building, and armed police had rushed into the shop, emerging 10 minutes later with the two men.

In the Wavertree district of Liverpool, residents described how unmarked black cars had sped down the street, stopping outside a flat, and a number of men wearing black combat gear had stormed the building. Three men were brought out handcuffed from the building. In a residential area in Manchester, meanwhile, a woman told how she had heard a lot of noise and opened her door to see “four or five policemen were on top of a man. They were dragging him along the street and he had no shoes on. They shouted at me ‘get inside, get inside’. There was a policeman on each corner of the street, with machine guns.”

The G20 protests

It looks increasingly likely that the lack of evidence of terror-related activities in the latest arrests will be attributed to the fact that the police operation had to be moved forward at the last moment.

Police have already claimed that the arrests were scheduled for 2 a.m. Thursday morning, but this was hurriedly changed after Assistant Commissioner Bob Quick of the Metropolitan Police was photographed the previous day entering Downing Street.

In full view of the cameras, Quick carried a briefing paper—marked top secret—with details of the intended raids. The government had issued a “D” notice preventing publication of the photograph, but concerned that it would be published on the Internet, hundreds of police officers were quickly scrambled for the northwest raids. Quick resigned the following day.

Quick’s “gaffe” is now being blamed for compromising an otherwise promising operation.

Just why Britain’s senior anti-terror officer was seemingly unaware that he was broadcasting details of a major police operation to the media is just one of many unanswered questions.

The Times speculated April 14 that indications that no terror charges would ultimately be laid against those arrested posed “questions about how real this threat was and whether the police were trying to cover their embarrassment over Mr. Quick.”

More pertinently, it should be noted that warnings of imminent suicide bombings on a major city came just as the government and Metropolitan Police faced mounting condemnation of police actions during the G20 summit of world leaders in London, which ended April 3.

During the protests, more than 200 people were arrested, houses were raided, and thousands of people detained for hours by police in London side streets in a practice known as “kettling.”

On April 1, Ian Tomlinson—who was making his way home from work—died in one of the side streets. At the time, it was claimed that his death was from natural causes, and unrelated to police measures to contain the protestors. (See “Britain: Evidence of fatal police assault at G20 demonstration”)

But on the evening of April 7, the Guardian released video footage showing how Tomlinson had been brutally struck from behind by a riot officer, causing him to fall and hit his head on the ground. He died minutes later.

The footage exposed the degree to which police, in collusion with the Independent Police Complaints Commission, had sought to cover over allegations of police brutality during the demonstrations, and fuelled demands for an independent inquiry.

Less than 24 hours later, Britain was faced with another alleged terrorist plot and civil liberties were under further attack.

At the weekend, it was announced that plainclothes, armed police units are to be deployed on the streets of Scotland for the first time.

No official statement, let alone discussion, accompanied this unprecedented move. But the Scotsman newspaper editorialised in support of the deployment, citing the alleged northwest terror plot, which it said could have led to “blood and suffering” on the streets of Manchester.

“As we assess our readiness against a terror attack we must also decide what concessions we are willing to make in our day-to-day liberties. To say we will surrender none is unreasonable,” it claimed.

Telegraph : Father of terror suspect accuses Britain of discrimination

Father of terror suspect accuses Britain of discrimination

The father of a suspect in the alleged Easter bomb plot to blow up shopping centres claimed his son is a victim of discrimination in Britain.

By Nick Allen, Duncan Gardham and Isambard Wilkinson | April 14, 2009

Abid Naseer, 23, is among 11 men still being questioned after a series of police raids in Manchester and Liverpool last week. Ten of the suspects are Pakistani nationals

His father Nasrullah Jan Khattak said: “My son prays five times a day and his only fault is that he has a beard. His only sin is that he is Muslim and Pakistani.

“I'm astonished how they could think that Abid has links with militant or terrorist groups. We are never involved in such activities. We only think about education and prayers and fasting and that's it.

“Ours is a religious-minded family but this doesn't mean that my son is part of a terrorist cell. He is peaceful, religious-minded and cricket-loving person.”

Mr Khattak, a contractor for the Pakistan government, was speaking at his home in Peshawar, the capital of Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province.

The Daily Telegraph understands that at least five of those being questioned are from the North-West Frontier Province, close to the Afghan border.

It is also understood that four of the suspects – Abid Naseer, Janas Khan, Umar Farooq and Hamza Shinwari - worked as security guards.

Mr Khattak said his son studied at the Islamia College in Peshawar before going to the UK on a student visa two-and-a-half years ago. The visa was due to expire in September this year.

He was studying for a master’s degree in information technology at Bradford Professional Study College, based in Manchester.

The college is based in a suite of offices on the top floor of a Manchester business park.

College spokesman Syed Naqui told the Daily Telegraph: “This is a genuine college. If anyone applies for one of our courses we check their passport, their qualifications and their right to be in this country. If they meet all our requirements we enroll them.”

The North West counter terrorism unit are still searching 10 properties in Liverpool, the Cheetham Hill area of Manchester, and in Clitheroe, Lancashire.

They have not found any explosives or identified a clear target for the alleged bomb plot.

Officers have found images of Manchester’s Arndale and Trafford shopping centres, the Birdcage nightclub and St Ann's Square, it is understood. One man, aged 18, has been released into the hands of immigration officials and will be deported.

In Pakistan Khan Mohammad Burki, whose son Abdul Wahab is one of those still being questioned, said: “This is nothing but discrimination. My son has been detained on mere suspicion as the police have no proof against him."

Haji Hazrat Ali said his son Mohammad Ramzan, 25, traveled to Britain in 2006 and was studying for an masters in business administration when he was arrested.

Mr Ali said "He is a very humble, gentle boy and always concentrates on his studies. I firmly believe he simply cannot be involved in any negative activity."

BBC : Bomb squad at terror search home

Bomb squad at terror search home

April 14, 2009

Officers from the North West's counter-terrorism unit have called in army bomb disposal experts to a building on Merseyside as a precaution.

A cordon has been set up around Highgate Street in the Wavertree area of Liverpool, and several homes were evacuated for a few hours on Monday.

The address is one of 12 searched as part of the anti-terror inquiry in north-west England.

Police are still questioning 11 people arrested during the investigation.

Another man, 18, who had been held by counter-terror officers, has been released to the UK Border Agency and is expected to be deported.

A Greater Manchester Police spokeswoman said: "At this stage the experts have been called in as a precaution.

"Officers are working to ensure this is resolved with minimum disruption to local people and appreciate the community's co-operation and understanding."

Police have so far found no evidence of any explosives since raiding the properties in Manchester, Liverpool and Clitheroe in Lancashire, last Wednesday as part of a suspected bomb plot.

Officers discovered pictures of popular Manchester shopping centres and a nightclub, sources told the BBC.

They were named as the Arndale and Trafford Centre shopping complexes, Birdcage nightclub and St Ann's Square.

However, senior police have insisted that no specific targets have been identified.

Daily Mail : Bomb disposal squad called in to site at centre of Liverpool terror arrests

Bomb disposal squad called in to site at centre of Liverpool terror arrests

By Charlotte Gill and Jaya Narain | April 13, 2009

Army bomb disposal experts have been called in by counter-terrorism officers investigating the suspected terror plot which saw 12 men arrested last week.

An area around Highgate Street in the Wavertree area of Liverpool was cordoned off as a precaution and a number of homes nearby were evacuated.

A spokeswoman for Greater Manchester Police stressed no dangerous device had been found but experts were brought in to help with the search of the property, which is continuing.

'At this stage the experts have been called in as a precaution.

'Cordons have been set up and a small number of homes evacuated.

'Officers are working to ensure this is resolved with minimum disruption to local people and appreciate the community's cooperation and understanding.'

Meanwhile sources said a number of the suspects arrested last week could be deported rather than charged due to lack of evidence against them.

The Pakistani men, most of them on British student visas, will be thrown out for breaching the terms of their entry if the police cannot find enough material to try them in court.

It is understood that the UK has already begun seeking assurances that the men would not face torture if they were sent back to Pakistan.

Deportations rather than charges would be humiliating for the police and M15 and embarrassing for Gordon Brown who said that arrests involved a 'very big terrorist' plot and criticised Pakistan for not doing more to tackle Islamist terrorism.

Extensive searches of properties have so far not believed to have led to the discovery of any bomb-making equipment or materials.

Yesterday police at one property in Manchester were seen removing sachets of sugar - sometimes used as a component in homemade explosives.

Police remain hopeful that information coming out of Pakistan coupled with emails, computer data and forensics found in the searched premises will lead to some charges.

Sources have said that the raids were brought forward after intelligence suggested that the group could strike as early as the Easter holiday.

Surveillance officers reported seeing some of the men filming buildings including the Trafford Centre, the Arndale Centre and the Birdcage nightclub in Manchester.

The terror raids in Greater Manchester, Lancashire and Merseyside were planned for last week but had to be rushed by 12 hours after police anti-terror chief Bob Quick was photographed holding a secret document detailing the targets.

The blunder led him to resign the following day.

Twelve men - 11 Pakistani nationals and a UK-born Briton - were arrested. One, an 18-year-old Pakistani man, has since been released and is in the custody of immigration officials.

The family of a man studying at Liverpool John Moores University said they believed that their son had been arrested and appealed for his release.

Relatives of Mohammad Ramzan, from Dera Ismail Khan in north west Pakistan, said they had been unable to contact him since last week.

His father Haji Hazrat Ali said the 25-year-old travelled to Britain in 2006 and was studying for an MBA.

He said: 'He is a very humble, gentle boy and always concentrates on his studies. I firmly believe he simply cannot be involved in any negative activity.'

The family of Abdul Wahab Khan, 26, who lived with Ramzan while they studied at the university, have also voiced concern that their he may be among those arrested.

Khan's older brother, Gulzar Jan, said he came to Britain in 2006 and was studying for a master's degree in IT.

He said: 'My brother is for sure innocent. He doesn't deserve the treatment he might be getting in custody in the UK.'

Relatives of the two men said deportation would be a 'great disgrace'.

Nasrullah Jan Khattak, the father of Abid Naseer who was named as a suspect, said: 'Ours is a religious-minded family but this doesn’t mean that my son is part of a terrorist cell.'

He said Naseer went to England two years ago to study IT at a university in Manchester. His student visa was due to expire in September.

Details of a third man said to be one of those arrested also emerged.

Janas Khan, 25, is a student at Hope University in Liverpool and was working as security guard at Homebase in Clitheroe, Lancashire along with another terror suspect.

He is thought to have stayed at a flat in Liverpool owned by an suspected terror financier, Mohammed Benhammedi, who is alleged to have raise funds for the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, which is associated with al Qaeda.

Officers have been granted a further week to detain the 11, who range in age from 22 to 41 and are being held in various locations across the country. They can be questioned for a maximum of 28 days before they have to be charged or released.

Times : Ghost in the terror machine

Ghost in the terror machine

Last week's raids were the result of a long investigation into a wider campaign plotted by an Al-Qaeda chief before his apparent death

David Leppard | From The Sunday Times | April 12, 2009

Early last Wednesday evening, Phil Harrow, a blood service courier from Toxteth, Liverpool, was sitting in front of his computer in his living room, his attention occasionally distracted by the sounds of the local children playing football on the street outside his front window on Cedar Grove.

At about 5.30pm, the peace was shattered and the children scattered in terror. “Eight armed officers, dressed in black from head to toe and wearing body armour and ski masks, jumped from an unmarked white van, screamed at the children to get out of the street and battered their way into the house two doors down from mine,” recalled Harrow.

Within minutes three unmarked police cars and four large yellow police vans had cordoned off the street and about 30 more officers were shouting at residents to stay indoors with their doors and windows shut.

Three Asian men were arrested and quickly driven off. The officers also took away a blue Nissan Micra and a black Vauxhall Corsa after neighbours told them the vehicles belonged to the men.

It was a pattern repeated across the city and the northwest of England as police swooped simultaneously as part of Operation Pathway, which was targeting an alleged Al-Qaeda-driven terror plot aimed at unspecified targets in Britain.

Elsewhere in Liverpool, a man was hauled out of a flat above an off-licence on Earle Road, Wavertree, about half a mile from Cedar Grove. At Liverpool John Moores University across the city, a student was dragged from the library and arrested.

In Manchester two men were picked up in a flat in the Cheetham Hill area, another couple were seized in a cybercafe and a fifth man was arrested on the M602 motorway. Two other men were held in Clitheroe, Lancashire, where they had been staying at a local B&B.

The arrest of the 12 men — 11 Pakistanis and one Briton — had been rushed forward because of a career-ending blunder earlier that day by Bob Quick, the Metropolitan police assistant commissioner who was Britain’s chief anti-terror officer.

Quick had been running late for a morning meeting with Gordon Brown at No 10, at which he was to tell the prime minister about the raids which had been planned for 6am the next day. In the taxi on the way, he was reading a document headed Secret: Briefing Note Operation Pathway. Quick was in such a rush that he forgot to put the document back in its buff folder before he got out of the cab.

A photographer snatched a picture of the document which was then transmitted to media outlets around the world. The operation had to be hastily brought forward by 12 hours.

Thankfully, Quick’s error had serious consequences only for himself — he resigned on Thursday morning — but it added unnecessary drama and danger to an operation that had already been a close-run thing — and which security sources fear is part of a much bigger threat.

THE trail to the Manchester raids is thought to have begun last December with the arrest of 14 suspected Al-Qaeda terrorists by Belgian police.

Officials believed a suicide bombing aimed at a two-day summit of European leaders, including Brown, was imminent after learning that one of the suspects had received a green light from his paymasters abroad.

During their detention, few of the men were prepared to co-operate with the Belgian authorities but one — whose identity remains a closely guarded secret — was willing to talk. In a series of interviews he described how he had been personally “tasked” to carry out a suicide attack in Belgium. His instructor was Rashid Rauf, a fugitive on the run from British police in Pakistan.

The would-be suicide bomber said that the Belgian plot was just one of a number of large-scale attacks that Rauf had planned across Europe. The targets were unidentified cities in Belgium, France, Holland and the UK.

Interviewed later by a member of MI5, the supergrass said that all he knew was that Rauf had dispatched a mastermind — whose pseudonym he gave — to a British city to make preparations for an attack. His tip-off was vague but it sparked one of the largest manhunts in MI5’s recent history.

Rauf, who was born in Pakistan but was brought up in the Midlands, has already been linked to a series of alleged high-profile Islamist terror plots, including the failed July 21 suicide bomb plot that targeted London in 2005.

Despite this known track record, Rauf’s real importance had been underestimated. About four years ago he became Al-Qaeda’s director of European operations.

Last November Rauf was reportedly killed when three American Hellfire missiles from a CIA predator drone destroyed a mud-built bungalow in a village in North Waziristan, in the lawless tribal lands that span the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Aerial photographs taken by the Americans after the missile strike show a body, originally thought to be Rauf’s, covered in a shroud being carried from the rubble. But original assessments that he is dead have been revised. “There is nothing definitely to say he’s actually dead,” said a senior western intelligence official last week.

“It may take a long time to find out. We honestly don’t know.”

Pakistani intelligence officials remain convinced that he was killed in the strike.

A few months earlier Rauf had sent several cells to Europe to carry out a series of linked attacks which were driven by Al-Qaeda’s hatred for Barack Obama — “a house negro” as Osama Bin Laden’s deputy has called him. Informed sources said it is now believed that the alleged northwest cell was part of this Europe-wide network.

The suspected members of the northwest cell had first came to the attention of MI5 about two months after the thwarted Brussels attack in December.

At any given time MI5 monitors about 2,000 people in Britain who form an estimated 230 networks suspected of links to violent extremism. Each individual is subject to a sliding scale of monitoring depending on the agency’s assessment of the threat they pose and how close they are thought to be to “attack planning”.

Each week a committee of senior MI5 officials meet at the agency’s headquarters in Westminster to review the status of each operation, upgrading and downgrading different investigations as appropriate.

Well placed officials say the alleged northwest cell had been the subject of investigation for several weeks since January. About a month ago that was suddenly stepped up after fresh information indicated that the members of the cell might be serious about attack planning. Operation Pathway was moved to the top of MI5’s priority list. Hundreds of police and MI5 officers were assigned to the investigation.

A number of suspects, many of them Pakistanis on student visas, were put under full-time surveillance. Their homes were bugged, their telephone calls were intercepted and they were followed night and day by officers from MI5’s A4 surveillance division.

This department specialises in covert surveillance. At terror camps in Afghanistan and the tribal areas of northwest Pakistan, Al-Qaeda terrorist recruits are routinely trained in counter-surveillance tactics. This can include switching back on their route, stopping suddenly in the street and generally being aware of everybody around them.

To circumvent this, MI5 employs people who look the opposite of the stereotypical spy. The agency has at its disposal an army of elderly women — many in their sixties and seventies — and young mothers with babies in prams.

There is also a range of James Bond-style devices which are the agency’s most closely guarded secrets. It is rumoured, for example, that MI5 has developed a colourless chemical which is “painted” on a suspect’s clothing or shoes during a covert entry of the suspect’s home while he or she is out. The suspect will then leave a trace of the chemical wherever he goes, allowing a trained MI5 dog to follow his trail.

It is not known whether any of these tactics were used in Operation Pathway. But about a fortnight ago surveillance officers reported that the suspects had been taking photographs of four locations in Manchester. These included the Arndale shopping centre, the smart shopping area of St Ann’s Square, the Trafford shopping centre and the Birdcage nightclub.

Critically, their e-mails were monitored — a highly sensitive task usually assigned in such operations to technical experts at GCHQ, the government’s eavesdropping agency at Cheltenham.

The turning point came about a week ago when a series of e-mails thought to have been received by at least one of the suspects indicated a specific timeframe for the alleged plot. The e-mails suggested that the cell had moved into the stage of attack planning. They showed a “window” for a possible attack of about five or six days from Good Friday. “Dates around the Easter holiday were mentioned,” one senior police source said this weekend.

Yet there remained serious gaps in the Pathway investigation. Despite the photographs, police say they had no definite evidence of the planned target. Neither had Pathway uncovered any evidence that the suspects had acquired explosives, arms or ammunition.

There was no indication, either, as to whether the planned operation was a suicide attack, or how many of those arrested would be directly involved and which of them were simply supplying logistical support such as purchasing materials or acting as drivers and reconnaissance scouts.

For MI5 officers running Pathway from the agency’s Northern Operations Centre (opened amid great secrecy last year in a northern city), these were good reasons to watch and wait. But the risks of letting the suspects run overrode that.

“There is always a challenge to balance the need to gather more intelligence with the need to protect the public. There was clear intent and signs of organisation, very clearly something was going on, so we acted to protect the public,” said a security source.

Early last week senior police and MI5 officers met at Scotland Yard and agreed that the suspected members of the cell should be arrested. The date for “executive action” was set for 6am last Thursday when the suspects would almost certainly be at home and asleep. But then came Quick’s unwitting intervention.

AS the police questioning of the arrested men continues at three separate locations, few details have emerged of their lives in Britain. Neighbours in Liverpool spoke last week of cars coming and going from addresses late at night and the playing of loud Islamic music from a flat occupied by one of the men, but the suspects appear to have had little interaction with people other than at work.

Two of the men worked as security guards at the Homebase DIY store in Clitheroe, but had been there for only two weeks. Two more were believed to have worked as contractors for Cargo2go, a delivery firm based at Manchester airport, because one of the men was driving one of the company’s vans when he was arrested.

However, Ian Southworth, a director, said yesterday that he was mystified at the suggestion. “All our drivers are owner-drivers. It could be a driver that used to work for us that’s left and sold the vehicle and the logo’s still on it, or it could have been a lost or stolen vehicle,” he said.

A number of the 11 Pakistanis arrested were from the tribal areas and had been admitted to Britain on student visas.

This has stoked up a political row, with Islamabad and Downing Street trading blows over who was responsible for lax checks on immigrants, especially those entering Britain on student visas which are notoriously abused.

Gordon Brown said Pakistan “has to do more to root out terrorist elements in its country”. The prime minister had said previously that two out of three terror plots uncovered by MI5 and police were hatched in Pakistan. But Wajid Shamsul Hasan, the Pakistan high commissioner, retaliated by saying the problem was “at your end”.

This weekend a senior immigration judge dismissed as “bluster” claims by Phil Woolas, the Home Officer minister, that the system for checking student visas had been recently tightened up and was “one of the best in the world”.

The judge pointed to the six-month closure, on security grounds, of the main visa office at the British high commission in Islamabad, which meant that cases were being channelled through an outpost in Abu Dhabi, 1,300 miles away. He said that at 50% of the appeals, by those on student visas refused entry to Britain, there was no Home Office representation. In many cases the only documentation produced as evidence was that provided by the appellant, “which can often be forged or inadequate”, said the judge.

His comments were echoed by John Tincey, chairman of the Immigration Service Union which represents border staff, who said that the proposed introduction of the e-borders system involving automated checks on visitors was fraught with danger.

“Foreign nationals could be allowed into Britain without being interviewed by an immigration officer,” he said.

“There is real danger that our immigration controls will be able to catch only those who are already known to the authorities and will be helpless to detect first-time terrorists and illegal immigrants.”

Chris Grayling, the shadow home secretary, said: “This is a completely shambolic system.”

THE arguments about the immigration system will continue for some time but this weekend the police priority was the continuing search of 10 properties in Manchester and Liverpool.

Yesterday police released an 18-year-old, the youngest of the suspects, into the custody of the UK Border Agency. They have 28 days to hold the 11 other men, who are aged between 22 and 41, before either charging them or releasing them.

The fate of Operation Pathway will hinge on whether they can gather enough evidence from the interviews and seized property for prosecutors to press charges.

Rauf’s plans for Europe-wide attacks leave intelligence agencies rushing to locate and defuse a group of ticking timebombs. Whether he is dead or alive, those ticking bombs are his real legacy.

Additional reporting: Kevin Dowling, Philip Cardy, Daud Khattak in Peshawar

Daily Express : More Terrorists Linked To Bomb Plot

MORE TERRORISTS LINKED TO BOMB PLOT

By Eugene Henderson and James Murray | April 12, 2009

DETECTIVES believe more than 30 people were involved in an alleged Al Qaeda plot to bring carnage to the centre of Manchester. Senior officers say 11 suspects they are questioning were at the heart of a terror cell as it prepared for a huge Easter holiday bombing campaign.

However, they believe other “key players” are still at large – and could provide the key to the group’s bomb making capabilities.

Police were yesterday given more time to interrogate the 11 suspects – all Pakistanis except one UK national – who remain in custody after an 18-year-old suspect was handed over to immigration officials.

The men were arrested in Liverpool, Manchester and Clitheroe, Lancs, in an operation sparked by Scotland Yard Assistant Commissioner Bob Quick’s blunder last Wednesday.

The anti-terror supremo was photographed carrying highly classified documents with the text clearly showing details of the planned raids as he went to brief Gordon Brown.

Senior detectives realise there is growing public concern that after such high-profile arrests, no bomb-making equipment has been found.

They admit they are facing a race against time to uncover the other members of the network as they continue to interrogate the men arrested during the raids.

Last night a senior police source said: “These people are known as second and third-tier players. They are on the periphery, but we can’t be sure how much they know or if they are capable of carrying out the attack.

“We haven’t found any explosives and we don’t know if these other men know where they are.”

The suspects came to the attention of intelligence sources after the arrest and questioning of four terror suspects arrested in Pakistan three months ago. That led to a watch on their emails and phone calls.

It is understood a list containing the names of at least 36 potential terrorists living in the UK has been handed to British intelligence from their counterparts in Pakistan.

Sources said police had arrested a 22-year-old man suspected of being the ringleader in Cheetham Hill, Manchester. Two other men were arrested at a nearby internet cafe.

At least two of the arrested men had worked on a self-employed basis for Cargo2Go, a delivery company based at Manchester Airport.

It is understood they used their own vans to deliver packages around the country.

The police source added: “Some of the suspects had a level of access to airports that would heighten our concerns, but as yet we haven’t found any ­evidence that they have used that to their advantage.”

Two other suspects were seized while working as security guards at a Homebase DIY store in Clitheroe.

As detectives continue their hunt, it can also be revealed that the processing of highly sensitive visas in Pakistan has been farmed out to a private commercial company.

Although there is a huge risk of suicide bombers and Al Qaeda supporters coming to Britain from Pakistan our High Commission in the capital Islamabad outsources the vital administration of visas to a company called Gerry’s International.

After being informed of the astonishing situation, the Tories immediately called on Home Secretary Jacqui Smith to make sure all the work was done by High Commission staff only.

“This is highly sensitive work and clearly should not be outsourced,” said Tory MP Patrick Mercer, chairman of a Home Affairs sub committee on terrorism. “The Government has to wake up to the fact that the system is a mess and needs tougher procedures with greater scrutiny.”

Nobody at the company or the High Commission was available to comment yesterday.

The demand comes after it was revealed that one of the suspects seized over the alleged terror plot to bomb Manchester got into the country from Pakistan with the wrong documents.

Damian Green, the Shadow Immigration Minister, said: “Ministers for years have failed to crackdown effectively on bogus colleges and courses. Their recent efforts have been too little too late.

“This another symptom of the wider failure of the Government’s immigration policy.”

Guardian : Terror bomb plot intelligence came from MI6's Pakistan operation

Terror bomb plot intelligence came from MI6's Pakistan operation

• Officers believed it was too risky not to act
• Searches fail to find evidence of conspiracy

Vikram Dodd, Nick Watt and Martin Wainwright | April 11, 2009

Key intelligence that led to security officials fearing a terrorist cell was to launch a large-scale bomb attack on British soil came from MI6 operations targeting Pakistan, the Guardian has learned.

Sources with knowledge of the investigation say the intelligence gathered first from abroad and then in Britain before Wednesday's raids, left counterterrorism officials believing there was too high a risk of an "imminent" attempt to bomb targets in Britain and cause mass casualties.

However, subsequent, intensive searches of at least 10 addresses linked to the suspected al-Qaida plot in northern Britain have so far failed to turn up any clear evidence of a terrorist conspiracy, despite the huge resources devoted.

Forty-eight hours after the arrests, sources close to the inquiry say no evidence has been found of bombs, bomb-making parts, precursor chemicals to make explosives, a bomb factory, weapons or ammunition.

The jigsaw of intelligence studied before the Wednesday raids left all agencies - from the police, to security services to Whitehall officials - convinced they had to arrest the 12 people detained. Yesterday they were still in custody. Investigators say the operation is at an early stage.

Examination of computers recovered from raids in Manchester, Liverpool and Clitheroe and their hard drives has only just begun. In past cases, data recovered from computers has been a source of incriminating evidence. Other forensic tests are also at an early stage.

One senior source said "nothing of huge significance" had been found, and accepted it was possible that no evidence could emerge before the 28-day limit to hold terrorism suspect expires.

But the source added: "There is lots of material that when put together may take us somewhere. It will be a long and drawn out investigation.

"If we don't charge it will look bad, but we had to take action. Was there any alternative; no there wasn't."

A central mystery remains how counterterrorism officials could believe such a serious plot existed when they were unsure of seemingly basic elements of the alleged conspiracy, such as the targets.

The Guardian has spoken to several informed sources with knowledge of the case, who paint a picture of fragments of intelligence coming in and fuelling a mounting concern that Britain was facing one of it's worst terrorist atrocities. They spoke on condition of anonymity.

Two to three weeks ago, intelligence from operations carried out in Pakistan by MI6, Britain's foreign intelligence agency, provided names of suspected members of an al-Qaida trained network in Britain.

That intelligence as well as the interception of calls and emails led UK security officials and police to fear a large terrorist attack was being planned in Britain.

The monitoring of calls and emails also led officials to believe a link existed between suspected al-Qaida commanders in Pakistan and the people in the UK.

An informed source said the plot was "al-Qaida driven". "There was concern [al-Qaida] was directing operations ... recruiting people to travel to this country, direct their operations and tell them what to do."

A large surveillance operation was put into place.

Some of those arrested were seen taking photographs near a Manchester nightclub, the Birdcage, and the Trafford shopping centre. The suspects were also seen taking photographs near other places in and around Manchester which are usually crowded.

The source said the suspect's behaviour was consistent with the way terrorists carry out reconnaissance ahead of an attack. But it was also consistent with a group of students in a new area taking photographs of themselves to show friends and family.

"There is no way we would use these [counterterrorism] powers for a bunch of people going around Manchester taking photographs," said the source.

Photographs of the nightclub and shopping centre have been recovered in the raids, but three separate sources continue to insist this can not be taken as evidence of targets.

A Whitehall source said: "They were not observed doing much suspicious."

Compared to other counter-surveillance operations carried out before arrest, the suspects were not seen buying materials that could be used to make explosives or other equipment known to have uses in making improvised explosive devices.

Then, several days ago, the surveillance operation targeting the 11 Pakistani nationals and one Briton heard a discussion about dates, including the Easter bank holiday weekend, taken as a reference to a possible date to stage the attack.

The decision was reached that the intelligence pointed to an imminent attack.

All agencies involved believed the men being watched had to be arrested.

One driving factor was the scale of feared casualties. "Is this territory where you can take a risk; no it's not," said the source.

Police activity was scaled down yesterday at the addresses being searched.

The procession of forensic officers with crates and bags from the houses, flats and internet cafes in Manchester and Liverpool came to halt early in the day.

In Liverpool, neighbours expressed their fears. Mother-of-five Marie Lee, 37, said: "People are reading stories about bomb factories but we've had nothing official to put our fears at rest."