LONDON, 31 March 2004 — Police arrested eight men and seized half a ton of ammonium nitrate, a frequently used bomb ingredient, in dawn raids by hundreds of officers around London yesterday, one of the biggest anti-terrorism operations in Britain since the Sept. 11 attacks.
Home Secretary David Blunkett, who has warned for months that London is a prime terrorist target, said the arrests were a “timely reminder” of the threat from Al-Qaeda. But a Muslim leader warned that the headline-grabbing raids risked demonizing the whole community.
In a sweep involving 700 officers, eight suspects were picked up in London and towns to the south and west on suspicion of involvement in the “commission, preparation or instigation” of acts of terrorism, London’s Metropolitan Police said.
Police said the ammonium nitrate — a fertilizer often used in terrorist bombings — had been recovered from a self-storage facility in west London. It is the largest seizure of potential bomb-making material in England since the Irish Republican Army suspended its campaign of violence in 1997.
“Part of the investigation will focus on the purchase, storage and intended use of that material,” said Deputy Assistant Commissioner Peter Clarke, head of the force’s anti-terrorist branch.
Clarke said the suspects were British, aged between 17 and 32, and were arrested as part of an operation targeting alleged international terrorist activity. He said the operation, which involved five police forces, was not connected to the Madrid train bombs earlier this month or to Irish terrorism. Clarke gave no details of the suspects’ background or religious affiliation, but he told reporters that “we in the police service know that the overwhelming majority of the Muslim community are law abiding and completely reject all forms of violence.”
Press Association, the British news agency, said all eight were of Pakistani descent, but police would not comment.
Three of the arrests were in Uxbridge and Slough, near Heathrow Airport west of London, and four in Crawley and Horley, near Gatwick to the south. Police refused to say whether there was any significance to the proximity. The eighth arrest was in Ilford, east London.
Residents in Luton, a town north of London where several homes were searched, expressed shock at the raids. Taxi driver Jarez Khan said he knew one of the families whose property was searched.
“I’d be amazed if they were involved in any kind of terrorism. They can’t have done anything wrong. They’re a nice family,” Khan said.
“From what I heard, the police came here at about 5 o’clock kicking doors down like (British police TV series) ‘The Sweeney.’ There are young children in those houses. What do they need to do this for? It’s over the top.”
Massoud Shadjareh, chairman of the Islamic Human Rights Commission, said such high-profile police operations fostered an impression that many Muslims supported terrorism.
