London bombs

[Ken]

http://www.dawn.com/2005/07/23/top1.htm

“An Asian guy ran on to the train. As he ran, he was hotly pursued by what I knew to be three plain-clothes police officers,” he told the BBC.

“As the man got on the train I looked at his face. He looked from left to right, but he basically looked like a cornered rabbit.

“He half-tripped, was half-pushed to the floor.

“One of the police officers was holding a black automatic pistol in his left hand. They held it down to him and unloaded five shots into him. I saw it. He’s dead, five shots, he’s dead,” he said.

“It was no more than five yards away from where I was sitting.”

I'm now very confused.

Did they think he had explosives on him?

If this account is accurate, and he was subdued, why did they shoot him?

I don't know about you, but if I was going to shoot someone who I thought had bombs in their possession, I wouldn't tackle them first.

Something is wrong with that picture, and I hope it isn't lost in the chaos of "protecting the people".

I hope everyone keeps their head and will not forgive mistakes.....or possibly worse, murder, on the premise that "Oh, he was just a dirty terrorist. Who cares?"

People can't play judge and jury with a defenseless person.

I'm hoping they had valid reason, and I hope there is an honest, open investigation into this incident.

We must carry the rule of law. People must prove to the terrorist organizations around the world that their civilization will not crack in the face of attacks.

[Malicious Intent]

Has someone else been reading Prison Planet? :)

It is a damn good question though.

[slum_goddess]

does everyone know that 'Asian' (in the UK) includes what we amerikans think of as 'Indian?' (i dint know that until last year.)

[The Hunter]

What they did is standard procedure for special forces when dealing with a possible bomber. A suicide bomber can still set off a bomb by various means, even when apparently subdued. This could have been an especially dangerous situation considering that it happened in a public place, if a another bomb went off.

Im not sanctioning these actions, especially as it appears that he was innocent of any wrongdoing, except failing to stop when asked. For many other countries this is SOP when dealing with possible terrorists.

This is the world that many people live, and deal with every day, and unfortunately it has made it much closer to home. With Londons police force streached to, and past the max trying to be more visible, and what appears to be SAS forces on the street, I fear that this is only the beginning in a country that has many officers that previously never carried guns.

[method77]

very well said Ken

[Malicious Intent]

Hunter - If SOP is for multiple police officers to jump on top of a home made bomb and then shoot it in a crowded place, then I dont feel safe!

I can almost imagine that perhaps the officers were heros. In a private jumping on top of a live granade moment, they did it to protect everyone, knowing that they couldn't risk a shot before that.

But even then, why shoot the torso? That is where the bomb would be. If despite having him subdued he was still somehow an immediate threat to life, why not a headshot?

[Malicious Intent]

Looks like PP got me again. I'm always carefult to read their sources and make sure nothing has been taken out of context like they often do. In this case, they managed to find the one source that didn't say all shots were in the head.

Still, people are not too happy that it happened:

LONDON (Reuters) - Police acknowledged on Saturday the man they shot dead on Friday was not connected to bomb attacks on London the previous day, calling the shooting tragic and regrettable.

"We are now satisfied that he was not connected with the incidents of Thursday 21st July 2005," police said in a statement.

"For somebody to lose their life in such circumstances is a tragedy and one that the Metropolitan Police Service regrets," the police said.

Police hunting four men who tried to bomb London's transport system on Thursday -- two weeks after suicide bombers killed 52 commuters -- shot dead the man who had been under surveillance and refused orders to halt.

The killing at point-blank range with five shots to the head in front of shocked passengers on a packed underground train triggered speculation that traditionally unarmed police had radically changed their iron-fist-in-velvet-glove approach.

"The man emerged from a block of flats in the Stockwell area that were under police surveillance as part of the investigation into the incidents on Thursday 21st July.

"He was then followed by surveillance officers to the underground station. His clothing and behaviour added to their suspicions," the statement said.

It added that the circumstances that led to the man's death were being investigated.

The killing had already been condemned by Muslim groups, who expressed shock at the news of the victim's innocence.

"To give license to people to shoot to kill just like that, on the basis of suspicion, is very frightening," Azzam Tamimi of the Muslim Association of Britain told BBC television.

"It is human lives that are being targeted here, whether by terrorists or in this case unfortunately by people who are supposed to be chasing or catching the terrorists."

Former Scotland Yard (London police) commander John O'Connor told the BBC: "It is a shocking incident, and I think the consequences may be graver if he turns out to be a young Muslim."

Read it all: http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/newsArticl...IN-INNOCENT.xml

[The Hunter]

I didnt say I agreed with it, but how else can they respond with the circumstances as I understand them? This is what really scares me, I dont believe that the proper response to innocent people getting killed, is more innocent ones killed out of panic.

You cant really say "Hey old bean you look a wee bit suspicious, so would you mind if we frisk you?" If he was guilty he could blow the bejesus out of a lot of folks. By running he gave the aura of guilt. Im really trying to see both sides here, but honestly I dont know how else they could have reacted. In other countries a hell of a lot of cops have been blown up under just these circumstances, these unnamed countries are the ones that have served in an advisery capacity to the police in how to react under these kind of circumstances.

[The Hunter]

Commentary on the shooting.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/talking_point/4711189.stm

[Malicious Intent]

Sounds like the BBC comments are much the same we have here.

I can't see there ever being an end to this debate.

[method77]

That shooting was a cold blooded crime no better than those bombings. Period.

[Umma]

The guy could have ran because he wanted to cause all this debate and uproar about whether or not the police should have the power to shoot to kill suspected terrorists... who knows.... extremists are twisted.

*shrugs*

[The Hunter]

The unfortunate part of this is that similar incidents have been more than likely going on in other countries for a long time, and that there probably going to be more of them closer to home, including my own home. With things such as this happening security is going to be tighter all the time. Much tighter, and more frayed nerves, both with the polic, and the civilians.

http://www.cbc.ca/story/world/national/200...harm050724.html

[The Hunter]

This is looking more like poorly trained panicked cops all the time.

Police shot Brazilian eight times

The man mistaken for a suicide bomber by police was shot eight times, an inquest into his death has heard.

Brazilian Jean Charles de Menezes, 27, was shot seven times in the head and once in the shoulder, at Stockwell Tube station, south London, on Friday.

Det Insp Elizabeth Baker revealed the details at a hearing in London.

Security sources said Mr Menezes had an out-of-date visa, but his family denied this. Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said he believed he was legally in the UK.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4713753.stm

[The Hunter]

'Bomb suspect' arrested by police

A man arrested in Birmingham by anti-terror police could be one of the suspects in the failed 21 July attacks on London, security sources say.

The man was held after being shot with a Taser stun gun. The BBC has learnt he was wearing a rucksack at the time.

He is expected to be taken to London's high-security Paddington Green police station for questioning.

A further three men were arrested at a separate Birmingham address and are being held in the city.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4720027.stm

[DudeAsInCool]

All four' 21 July suspects held

SUSPECTED BOMBERS WANTED

CONFIRMED ARRESTS

1: Yasin Hassan Omar, 24, wanted over bomb attempt on Tube near Warren Street.

2: Muktar Said Ibrahim, 27, suspected of attempting to bomb a No 26 bus in Shoreditch

UNCONFIRMED ARRESTS

3: Third man, unnamed, wanted over failed attempt to bomb a Tube near Oval. Not confirmed he is among Friday's arrests

4. Fourth man, wanted over the Shepherd's Bush attack; Italians say they have arrested the fourth bomber, but the Met have not confirmed

All four failed London bomb suspects are thought to be in custody following armed raids in the UK capital and Rome

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4727975.stm

[slum_goddess]

mail from Steffi in London last night:

'guess what? two of my mates live in the estate where the cops raided today in north kensington down the road from our place... about 9 of us had arranged to have a meal at a little thai restaurant on the edge of the estate but who knows if we'll be able to get in now. the residents have all been evacuated and told they might not be let back home for days! rumour is they'll all have to sleep in the local sports centre so looks as if we'll have two extra guests on the sofas tonight as well as ken's poor daughter (came down to get away from the stress of 2 kids!)

ken just called me from kings cross & said it's like a war zone, he greeted donna with 'welcome to hell'!! it's getting more & more surreal as the days go on, got to the stage now where nothing surprises us!

they've also raided a house off portobello road so the buses'll be totally fucked. can't remember what a boring life's like! ;-)

[Malicious Intent]

All over the news today.

Turns out the murdered Brazillian, de Menezes (who the police said was wearing bulky clothes, ran from officers and vaulted the ticket barriers), walked normally into the station, stopped to pick up a free newspaper, used his travel card to get in and only started to run when he saw a train already at the station.

He was carrying no bags and wearing a light denim jacket. When the police called, he stood up, before being restrained and then shot in the head 7 times in the head and one in the shoulder. 3 other bullets missed.

If that wasnt bad enough, Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair called for there to be a delay in the investigation into the shooting for national security reasons.

I feel sick to my gut.

The only glint of hope is that the media are daring to cover this story. I think the questions asked need to be a lot tougher. For example, who were the eye-witnesses that told the same story as the police?

Tony Blair has always said he will do as Ian Blair asks to help tackle terrorism. Ian Blair has previously stepped out of line on many issues, such as ID cards and taking DNA samples from suspected offenders, however minor the crime (e.g. speeding). The man is clearly towing the labour party line.

Now he needs to be booted out and everything he has said needs to be reviewed to make sure that nothing else has been for the good of labour and his own powers, rather than sticking to his supposed job of fighting crime.

Will it happen? Of course not - national security comes before justice.

This is just what has been leaked so far. The investigation continues.

http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/newsArticl...ITY-BRITAIN.xml

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4157892.stm

http://news.google.co.uk/news?q=Ian%20Blai...ial&sa=N&tab=wn

[slum_goddess]

The only glint of hope is that the media are daring to cover this story.

yup, at least you (you = we in the UK, but most you being English) have that.

[The Hunter]

Shoot-to-kill error causes U.K. uproar

London — Britain's terrorist-hunting strategy drew fierce criticism yesterday after it emerged that police mistook an innocent Brazilian electrician for a threatening terrorist because he was in the wrong place, at the wrong time, with the wrong appearance.

The family of Jean Charles de Menezes, the 27-year-old immigrant who died in a London subway train after police fired several bullets point-blank into his head on July 22, demanded murder charges be laid against the officers.

And a growing number of officials were calling for an end to the "shoot-to-kill" policy, even as police were talking of the success of their anti-terrorism campaign yesterday and Italy announced it will deport one of the would-be bombers from the failed July 21 attacks. With the deportation of Hamdi Isaac, Scotland Yard will have all four suspects in custody.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/sto.../International/

[slum_goddess]

interesting stuff: the rise of the democratic police state by John Pilger

'...Friedman's latest bark is about free speech, which his country's constitution is said to safeguard. He wants the State Department to draw up a blacklist of those who make "wrong" political statements. He is referring not only to those who advocate violence, but those who believe American actions are the root cause of the current terrorism. The latter group, which he describes as "just one notch less despicable than the terrorists", includes most Americans and Britons, according to the latest polls.

Friedman wants a "War of Ideas report" which names those who try to understand and explain, for example, why London was bombed. These are "excuse makers" who "deserve to be exposed". He borrows the term "excuse makers" from James Rubin, who was Madeleine Albright's chief apologist at the State Department. Albright, who rose to secretary of state under President Clinton, said that the death of half a million Iraqi infants as a result of an American-driven blockade was a "price" that was "worth it". Of all the interviews I have filmed in official Washington, Rubin's defence of this mass killing is unforgettable.

'Farce is never far away in these matters. The "excuse makers" would also include the CIA, which has warned that "Iraq [since the invasion] has replaced Afghanistan as the training ground for the next generation of 'professionalised’ terrorists'." On to the Friedman/Rubin blacklist go the spooks!

'Like so much else during the Blair era, this McCarthyite rubbish has floated across the Atlantic and is now being recycled by the prime minister as proposed police-state legislation, little different from the fascist yearnings of Friedman and other extremists. For Friedman's blacklist, read Tony Blair's proposed database of proscribed opinions, bookshops, websites.

'The British human rights lawyer Linda Christian asks: "Are those who feel a huge sense of injustice about the same causes as the terrorists - Iraq, Afghanistan, the war on terrorism, Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib - to be stopped from speaking forthrightly about their anger? Because terrorism is now defined in our law as actions abroad, will those who support liberation movements in, for example, Kashmir or Chechnya be denied freedom of expression?" Any definition of terrorism, she points out, should "encompass the actions of terrorist states engaged in unlawful wars."

Of course, Blair is silent on western state terrorism in the Middle East and elsewhere; and for him to moralise about "our values" insults the fact of his blood-crime in Iraq...'

[slum_goddess]

forgot this next part:

His budding police state will, he hopes, have the totalitarian powers he has longed for since 2001 when he suspended habeas corpus and introduced unlimited house arrest without trial. The Law Lords, Britain's highest judiciary, have tried to stop this. Last December, Lord Hoffmann said that Blair's attacks on human rights were a greater threat to freedom than terrorism. On 26 July, Blair emoted that the entire British nation was under threat and abused the judiciary in terms, as Simon Jenkins noted, "that would do credit to his friend Vladimir Putin". What we are seeing in Britain is the rise of the democratic police state.

!!!!! :nope:

[Malicious Intent]

:reallymad:

What I really dont get is that we have been told this was coming for a long time - so why has Blair completely lost the plot now that it has?

"We will fight these terrorists with our liberal values - first of all we are going to rip up the Human Rights Act... What, you want to still be teated as humans after this?? But I can care for you if you are cattle......Fine, OK, we will push through the anti-terror legislation and the politicians can lock away people who aren't good for us - i mean you - indefinitely and without trail....... What do you mean innocent to proven guilty? Separation of waht?? Rings a bell from my law school days, but....? How about I brand you all with ID cards? No, you dont want to be my property? GRRR! Fine - you dont want what I want - we will just ask the police, I will do as they request. Ian Blair has requested a full surveillance and police state - how does that sound....? OH COME ON! 1984 wasn't that bad! How about we charge everyone with a different political view with treason? Hmm, lawyers say that wont work.

"Fuck it, I'm going on holiday."

[Synthirius]

Just want to add my point of view on the situation, i have been reading news and analyses for a very long time, let's say since the first gulf war started, back then i cutted all newspaper articles, and collected them in a few books..

When the 2nd gulfwar started 2 years ago i didn't repeat this because i had a feeling this would take much longer than expected, this might be a bit off topic but it is all part of the misery we are living in, we always tend to ignore the bad things that occur in our life, but now the situation has moved very close to our own society..

We all have to question ourselfs why this is occuring, nothing can justify the loss of innocent lives, no matter where in the middle east or here in europe.

Many people feel themselfs powerless specialy the people of countries that don't reflect the foreign policy of their goverment, i'm sure there many, and powerfull people are abusing the fear that each of us is living with.

Let's just hope that this madness will soon stop, and a everlasting world peace will occur, this is what everyone deserves on this planet.

So far a few of my thoughts,

Cheers, synthirius.

Edited August 20, 2005 by Synthirius

[slum_goddess]

What I really dont get is that we have been told this was coming for a long time - so why has Blair completely lost the plot now that it has?

i used to think that bu$hCo had some heavy blackmail material over blair but now i dunno, they're so alike it's scarey (and dangerous for everybody else).

When the 2nd gulfwar started 2 years ago i didn't repeat this because i had a feeling this would take much longer than expected

it's amazing to me how someone like you who's a casual observer knew this shit and someone like me, who hasn't given a fuck about these things in ages, we knew this shit but others dint wanna know (or didnt care).

politicians should fight it out themselves--let them take all the risks.