|
|
|||||||
|
|
|||||||
|
News Search
|
|
8-07-2005 The Scotsman Four bombs in 56 minutes that brought terror to London By Gethin Chamberlain TERRORISTS struck at the heart of London yesterday, detonating a series of bombs in a long-threatened attack which killed dozens of people and injured hundreds more. There was no warning before the four bombs exploded, hitting three packed Underground trains and a double decker bus within the space of an hour that forced Britain to confront the menace of al-Qaeda terror. By last night, the official death toll stood at 37, including two on the bus. But ambulance sources indicated that the bus carnage was expected to include at least 20 dead and there were suggestions from other sources that the total toll could rise even higher. The number of injured was also rising. Last night, it stood at 700, 95 of them serious - however ambulance sources placed the figure above 1,000. A group calling itself the Secret Organisation Group of al- Qaeda of Jihad Organisation in Europe used an Islamic website to claim responsibility for the attacks, though there was no independent confirmation of the claim. There were indications that at least one of the bombs, and possibly more, may have been suicide attacks. One passenger on the bus said he saw an "agitated" man rummaging in a bag seconds before the blast tore off the bus roof and peeled back the sides like a sardine can. Tony Blair, the Prime Minister, flew back to London from the G8 summit promising intense police and security service action to bring the bombers to justice. "It is particularly barbaric that this has happened on a day when people are meeting to try to help the problems of poverty in Africa and the long-term problems of climate change and the environment," he said. "Just as it is reasonably clear that this is a terrorist attack or a series of terrorist attacks, it is also reasonably clear that it is designed and aimed to coincide with the opening of the G8. He went on: "They are trying to use the slaughter of innocent people to cow us, to frighten us out of doing the things that we want to do, trying to stop us from going about our business as normal, as we are entitled to do and they should not and they must not succeed. "When they try to intimidate us, we will not be intimidated. When they seek to change our country or our way of life by these methods, we will not be changed." Mr Blair held a crisis management meeting with senior ministers and security officials and was expected to return to Gleneagles last night to resume the summit. Meanwhile hundreds of London police officers involved in the G8 security operation were heading back to the capital. Scotland Yard officially confirmed that at least 37 people were killed and there were 700 casualties, 300 of whom were taken to hospital by ambulance. The first bomb detonated at 8:51am in a tunnel about 100 yards from Liverpool Street Underground station. Moorgate and Aldgate East stations were also affected by the blast, which killed at least seven people. Five minutes later a second device went off in the area of King's Cross and Russell Square, killing at least 21 people. The third Underground blast occurred at 9:17 am on a train heading into Edgware Road station which blew a hole in a wall on to a train on an adjoining platform. A third train was also caught up in the incident, which last night had claimed five lives. At 9:47 am, a fourth explosion tore the roof off a red number 30 double-decker bus in Tavistock Place packed with commuters forced above ground after the Tube network had been shut down. Staff nurse Terence Mutasa, 27, who works at University College Hospital, said: "I treated two girls in their 20s who were involved in the bus bomb. They were saying some guy came and sat down on the bottom deck and that he exploded. They said the guy sat down and the explosion happened. They thought it was a suicide bomber." Witness Philippe Palmer, 42, said the explosion sounded like a sonic boom: "About five or six people were thrown out of the top of the bus along with debris. The whole place was covered in smoke and people were staggering out of the bus door." Jarvis Medhurst, working at a nearby hotel, described a scene of carnage: "There was a massive explosion and a cloud of smoke, and then when the smoke stated to die down, you could see the wrecked bus, which was on fire," he said. "There were bodies everywhere. Heads and bits of bodies, heads and arms and legs all ripped away. There seemed to be kids lying around as well as adults. I'm just in shock, it's something I'll never forget." Geraldine Fourmon was in Tavistock Square when the bomb went off: "There was a big bang. After the smoke went away I realised there was a double decker bus exploded. People were running towards me screaming and crying. "I saw at least five people jump from the top deck of the bus. Half of it was blown away. They were jumping on to the street to escape." A Stagecoach spokesman said the driver of the bus suffered shock and was later taken to hospital, but was not seriously injured. "He remained at the scene after the blast trying to help the victims," the spokesman added. Belinda Seabrook was on the bus in front of the one which was blown up. She said: "I heard an incredible bang. I turned round and half the double decker bus was in the air." Passengers reeling out of the Underground stations described scenes of carnage below ground level. They described how people trapped inside the bombed carriages and those around them prayed, panicked and smashed train windows with their bare hands to try to let in some air. Carriages filled with smoke and the screams and shouts of the injured. Michael Henning, 39, his shirt and suit soaked in blood, was on the Aldgate train when the bomb went off: "The first I knew I saw silver travelling through the air which was glass and a yellow flash and then I was getting twisted and thrown down on the ground. The blast just twisted and pinned me. I was in the next carriage but within ten feet of where the bomb went off." Mr Henning said that after that he remained on the train for about 25 minutes. "It was very dark all around us. People panicked and were screaming and a few were telling them to calm down. "The girls were the calmest. They got everyone under control quickly. We tried to open the side doors. We were trying to pull them but they weren't moving. There was a lot of dust and smoke. "In the carriage hit by the bomb there was part of the side wall missing. Some of the seats were missing. People were still in their seats and they were screaming in pain and covered in blood down one side of their body. There were other people that were trapped and they were just left there." Another passenger, Gracia Hormigos, said: "My whole body was in shock. There was a guy slumped over somebody else. He was dead. I knew he was dead." Robert Andrews, 28, described seeing two bodies lying on the track at Aldgate. "The doors of the train had been blown off and were lying on the track. The roof of the train was also a twisted, mangled mess - it looked like silver foil," he said. "It reminded me of the Madrid bombings. It was very scary." Simon Corvett, 26, from Oxford, was on an eastbound train leaving Edgware Road Tube station. He said: "There were just loads of people screaming and the carriages filled with smoke. You couldn't really breathe and you couldn't see what was happening." "The fire crews witnessed some very harrowing scenes and they performed magnificently in the face of that," said Ken Knight, Fire Commissioner for the London Fire Brigade. Terrorism expert Professor Paul Wilkinson, of St Andrews University, said it was clear that "a major terrorist attack" had taken place with "all the trademarks of ... al-Qaeda". Asked if this was the terrorist attack on London Scotland Yard had long feared, Sir Ian Blair, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, said: "It may be, it probably is and we are very concerned about it. Mr Blair learned of the devastation minutes after holding a joint news conference with his partner in the war on terror George Bush, the United States president, who vowed to help hunt the bombers down. "It's a war on terror for us all," he said. "I was most impressed by the resolve of all the leaders in the room. Their resolve is as strong as my resolve, and we will not yield to these people. "We will find them, we will bring them to justice and at the same time we will spread an ideology of hope and compassion that will overwhelm their ideology of hate." Kofi Annan, the United Nations secretary general, said he was "devastated" by the attacks but expressed confidence in the British spirit. "These vicious acts have cut us all to the core, for they are an attack on humanity itself," he said. The Queen said she spoke for the whole nation in expressing her sympathy to all those affected and the relatives of the dead and injured. Last night, police said they were receiving 42,000 calls an hour and were asking members of the public concerned about relatives or friends to try to make direct contact first. Hospital staff were continuing to treat the wounded, with a spokesman for the Royal London Hospital reporting that several patients required amputations. Casualties arrived at the hospital by air ambulance and double decker buses. One visitor to the hospital said the wards were so crowded that some people were being treated in the canteen. Ambulances drew up at the door where a bank of wheelchairs, drips, stretchers and staff were waiting. Doctors and nurses rushed forward to greet each patient as ambulances arrived. One woman was brought out in a stretcher, her head immobilised, a white blanket wrapped tightly around her. Her face was covered in blood, her feet sticking out of the blanket were blackened with soot and bloody. She winced in pain and called out weakly "nurse, nurse, nurse". There were already three nurses and other staff around her. A drip was held up and she was wheeled away. Brian Paddick, the Deputy Assistant Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, said investigations into the blasts were at an early stage. He also confirmed that police would be studying closed-circuit television footage as part of their attempts to trace the bombers. He said: "At the moment we don't know if this was suicide bombers or whether it was packages left on the bus or in Underground stations - it's too early to say. "There is no indication that these were anything other than conventional explosives, but other than that we don't have any information about the size or type of device used. We've had considerable success in the past using closed-circuit television footage in order to trace the movements of the people involved. That will be one of our first priorities, as well as securing forensic evidence." Mr Paddick said he did not know whether the al-Qaeda claim was genuine or not and refused to be drawn on whether or not the terror attacks were the work of Muslim extremists. He said: "As far as I am concerned, Islam and terrorists are two words that do not go together. There may be people who describe themselves as Muslims who carry out these acts but it is totally against what I understand to be the Islamic faith. "We are treating this as a terrorist incident and we are keeping an open mind about who the perpetrators might be." In the hours after al-Qaeda claimed responsibility for the attack, London's religious leaders moved quickly to allay fears of racial tensions and backlash against Muslims. Outside the Royal London Hospital, in the centre of London's most ethnically diverse community, Bishop Stephen Oliver of Stepney and Dr Muhammed Abdul Bari, the chairman of the East London Mosque, together urged people to unite. Bishop Oliver said: "This was an atrocity against humanity and a lot of people are traumatised by what has happened today." Asked about the risk of further attacks, Mr Paddick said: "Clearly we want to make sure that the transport system is safe. "We do not have any intelligence but there is a threat of other devices." Downing Street refused to attribute the bomb blasts to al-Qaeda in any public statements, but a spokesman for the Prime Minister made it clear that Mr Blair had been told by the security services that the bombs were almost certainly the work of Islamic terrorists. Mr Blair went out of his way in his statement from Downing Street to praise the Muslim Council for Great Britain and he has stressed that the vast majority of British Muslims were law-abiding citizens. The Prime Minister's spokesman said he would not attribute blame at this stage, but he added: "[Mr Blair] chose his words carefully." The spokesman indicated that Mr Blair was aware both of the likelihood that the bombs were the work of al-Qaeda and also of the need to prevent any kind of backlash against British Muslims. "This country is a tolerant country which respects differences and he wants to preserve these values at all costs," the spokesman said. And he added: "That is why he went out of his way today, just to underline that point and also to reassure Muslims that that is his view." Many experts said that while bombers may be inspired by Osama bin Laden, from Bali to Madrid the terror attacks have been carried out and funded by home-grown networks. Several experts said up to 15 or 20 people might be involved in planning such an attack including reconnaissance of the targets. In Holland recently, the murder of film-maker Theo Van Gogh saw the Hofstad network broken up, where a core of about 15 people was said to be backed by some 200 militants and more than 1,000 sympathisers in the Netherlands alone. Last year, Sir John Stevens, the retiring commissioner of London's Metropolitan police, estimated that about 100 people trained by al-Qaeda were at large in Britain and as many as 200 people could be involved in planning terrorist attacks. Forensic analysis of the blast radius of the London bombs, the sophistication of the explosives and mechanisms used may indicate the level and equipment and training the bombers possessed. Last night, police said all buses and Underground stations would be searched before being re-opened, though a row later broke out after Tube drivers refused to carry out security inspections on London Underground trains, arguing that police or army officers should give the all-clear before services could resume. Transport for London said staff would be "working through the night in an effort to restore services to parts of the network tomorrow". The East Coast main line train operator GNER said there would be no trains between King's Cross and Peterborough today. Shops and banks in central London closed their doors early following the explosions and last night hundreds of thousands of commuters were attempting to get home from London. Although nearly all main line London rail stations were open by late afternoon, the Tube still remained shut. Bus services in the heart of the capital were only slowly returning to normal. The explosions also had an impact on the financial markets, with the FTSE-100 Index plunging more than 200 points early on as traders reacted to the carnage. At one point, the blue-chip index stood 207.5 points lower but later recovered some of its poise to limit the losses to below 100 points. The Union Flag will be flown at half mast on all government buildings today, officials confirmed yesterday.
|
|
||||
|
................................................................................................................. Copyright ©2004 Gethin Chamberlain. All rights reserved. |
|||||||
