Times : 7/7 bombers could not have acted alone

7/7 bombers could not have acted alone

Commentary: Andy Hayman | April 29, 2009

The acquittals of three men on charges of helping the July 7 suicide bombers leave me with a sense of bitter disappointment. I suspect that feeling is shared by the families of the victims, the survivors and the police investigation team.

These charges would not have been brought unless police and prosecutors were satisfied that there was significant evidence implicating the defendants in the preparation of the 7/7 attacks.

I have no doubt that Mohammad Sidique Khan and the other three bombers had significant assistance from others here and overseas.

There were several sets of fingerprints, other than those of the four dead bombers, in the bomb factory in Leeds. There was extensive telephone contact with other people, here and in Pakistan. In my mind, it is inconceivable that the only people involved in planning these attacks were the four who carried them out.

The end of this trial probably represents the last throw of the dice for the police investigation into 7/7. It is extremely frustrating to reach this milestone knowing that people who aided and abetted the murders of 52 innocent people remain at large. I remain firmly of the view, however, that everything that could possibly be done was done and every lead was pursued.

The scale of the investigation was immense: more than 37,000 exhibits were examined, 4,700 telephones seized, producing more than 90,000 numbers requiring analysis and 24,000 people to be traced, interviewed and eliminated. Officers from Scotland Yard relocated to West Yorkshire to conduct inquiries.

This investigation was conducted by counter-terrorism units that were stretched to their limit and ran alongside inquiries into 11 other high-profile terrorist cases. But at the end of that inquiry the evidence that could be put before the court was circumstantial. Perhaps that is the only evidence there was to be found. A brave choice was made to put it before a jury and let justice take its course.

This was no half-baked police operation. I know that the officers involved had the grief of the bereaved etched on their minds. However, despite their best efforts, the evidence was not convincing enough.

Andy Hayman was Assistant Commissioner Special Operations in the Metropolitan Police 2005-07

Guardian : 7/7 bomb attacks: police and MI5 cleared of blame

7/7 bomb attacks: police and MI5 cleared of blame

MPs say agency suffered serious lack of resources
Survivor describes report as 'catalogue of excuses'

Rachel Williams and Richard Norton-Taylor | May 19, 2009

Families of the victims of the 7 July suicide bombings today stepped up demands for an independent inquiry, as a long-awaited report into whether the atrocities could have been prevented revealed that the bombers' leader had crossed the radar of police and MI5 on eight occasions but had never been assessed as a threat.

The intelligence and security committee (ISC) cleared the police and agencies of any blame for failing to track Mohammad Sidique Khan and his right-hand man, Shehzad Tanweer, after they appeared as part of an investigation into a plot to detonate fertiliser bombs in the UK, almost 18 months before the 2005 attacks in London; the ISC said there was no evidence the pair planned to launch attacks themselves.

But it also listed a string of occasions, dating back to 1993, when versions of Khan's name or addresses connected to him were recorded by police or MI5, all but the earliest because of links to people being investigated over extremism.

In unprecedented detail, the committee also revealed a lack of co-operation between MI5 in London and police special branch in West Yorkshire. But it concluded that MI5 suffered at the time from a serious lack of resources.

The heavily censored, 102-page report revealed that in 2001 West Yorkshire police had videoed Khan at a training camp in the UK organised by two known extremists, an event described as a "significant lead" by the ISC. Images from the footage were shown to their sources but Khan was not identified.

The other pieces of information on Khan, held variously by West Yorkshire police, the Metropolitan police and MI5, were never connected before 7 July. It was "surprising" that MI5 said it had not identified Khan by then, given the amount of information held, the report said.

Rachel North, a survivor of the attacks, which killed 52 people, said she was "sad but not surprised" by the report. She described it as a "catalogue of excuses for MI5's narrow focus and failure of intelligence caused by failure of imagination and failure of co-operation [between police and MI5] at a critical time".

The report revealed that MI5 is not automatically informed when the police special branch receives intelligence about terrorism. It also said MI5 had no legal power to pass to the police all the intelligence it collects from counter-terrorism operations. But the committee concluded that, having looked at all the evidence in "considerable" detail, "we cannot criticise the judgments made by MI5 and the police on the information that they had and their priorities at the time".

Ten secure emails were exchanged between MI5 and West Yorkshire police referring to an individual now known to be Khan after the fertiliser bomb plotters had been arrested, the ISC discovered, but the force "did not find anything significant".

The chairman of the ISC, Kim Howells, said: "Our criticism at the time was mainly that MI5 acted on a need-to-know basis and there ought to have been a more complete dialogue between MI5 and special branch."

The report repeatedly asserted that MI5's lack of resources meant it could not have followed Khan and Tanweer after the fertiliser plotters had been arrested. Even if the service had had greater capacity, it would not have happened since they were not seen as a threat, it added.

It described it as "astounding" that in 2004 it was not possible to provide intelligence coverage for 52 "essential" targets, and MI5 could only provide reasonable coverage for 6% of the overall known threat. The MPs said that despite an increase in surveillance capability since then, the committee remained "concerned that not enough targets can be covered adequately".

The committee said that in the course of this second review of the intelligence it had uncovered new information that even the organisations involved had not connected together before.

Giving evidence in June 2007, the head of MI5 admitted it was "unsatisfactory" that even then the service was discovering new references to Khan.

It was not until after the 2005 attacks that a conversation in the car of Omar Khyam, leader of the fertiliser plotters, was fully transcribed and then revealed that Tanweer was present, praising the Madrid bombings.

The report said it was possible that a "facilitator", whose name is redacted, was involved in the 7 July bombings. The Guardian understands the individual is Rashid Rauf, a British-Pakistani believed to have died in an American drone strike on the Afghan border.

The former shadow home secretary, David Davis, said there was a clear need for a senior judge to lead an investigation. "There were errors which, if avoided, would have led to a prevention of this attack."

Gordon Brown said there was no evidence to support allegations about missed clues or ignored warnings and that an investigation into the fertiliser bombs understandably took precedence.

Times : 7/7 bombings: end of the road

7/7 bombings: end of the road

Sean O’Neill and David Brown | April 29, 2009

No one will be brought to justice for the mass murder of 52 people in the 7/7 London bombings, security sources conceded last night as three men were acquitted of helping the terrorists.

After a massive security operation, a four-year investigation and two trials costing well in excess of £100 million, three friends of the lead suicide bomber, c, were cleared by a jury of being part of his support cell. Sadeer Saleem, 28, left court a free man but Waheed Ali, 25, and Mohammed Shakil, 32, were convicted of attending terrorist training camps and will be sentenced today.

Detectives are certain that the bombers received help from within the Muslim community in Beeston, Leeds, which, they say, is reluctant to co-operate with police. Sources said that potential witnesses had been “actively dissuaded” from helping police. As many as ten sets of unidentified fingerprints were found in bomb factories used by Khan, 30, and the three other men who killed themselves in the attacks on three Tube trains and a London bus on July 7, 2005.

Deputy Assistant Commissioner John McDowall, of the Scotland Yard Counter Terrorism Command, said: “While those directly responsible for the bombings died in the attacks, we remain convinced that others must have been involved in the planning.”

Mr McDowall appealed for witnesses to come forward, but Andy Hayman, the Yard’s head of counter-terrorism in July 2005, writes in The Times today that the trial was “the last throw of the dice” for the 7/7 investigation.

Survivors and relatives of the victims accepted the verdicts with resignation and demanded immediate publication of an Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) report into 7/7, the urgent opening of inquests and an independent inquiry with powers to summon witnesses.

“We want an inquiry which can get to the bottom of what went wrong and why Khan wasn’t stopped. We don’t want a witch-hunt, we just want the truth,” said Rachel North, who was injured in the blast at King’s Cross.

The ISC report is expected in two weeks. The key issue for the relatives will be the fate of a fax message sent by MI5, which watched Khan in 2004 as he associated with another British terrorist, to West Yorkshire Police asking for his movements to be watched.

Informed sources say that receipt of the fax was never acknowledged. Police did not monitor Khan and he flew to Pakistan where he was groomed by al-Qaeda leaders to become a suicide bomber.

Graham Foulkes, whose son David, 22, died on a Circle Line train at Edgware Road, said that the trial revealed that there had been significant pre-attack intelligence about Khan.

He said: “Immediately after the bombings the Home Secretary, Tony Blair and other politicians were saying these men were ‘clean skins’ and the attacks came ‘out of the blue’. Either they were lying, or the intelligence community lied to the politicians.”