Original source URL: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=HYL20070509&articleId=5601 British terror trial raises question of what MI5 knew about 2005 London bombings By Julie Hyland Global Research, May 9, 2007 wsws.org Following a series of damning revelations during the trial of seven men for their roles in the alleged ³fertiliser bomb plot,² the government is continuing to dismiss calls for an independent inquiry into the July 7, 2005, London bombings. Last week, Omar Khyam, Waheed Mahmood, Jawad Akbar, Salahuddin Amin and Anthony Garcia were jailed for life for conspiring to cause explosions likely to endanger life between January 1, 2003, and March 31, 2004. Two other men, Nabeel Hussain and Shujah Mahmood, were found not guilty after one of the longest-running anti-terror trials in the world. Operation Crevice involved 3,644 witness statements and 105 prosecution witnesses. The jury took a record 27 days to deliberate their verdict. The seven were accused of purchasing 600 kg of ammonium nitrate (used as fertiliser) and storing it in a London unit in preparation for a major bomb attack in Britain. The 13-month hearing heard transcripts of the accused discussing potential targets including the Bluewater Shopping Centre in southern England and nightclubs. Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair described the trial and its outcome as a ³triumph² for Britain¹s intelligence services and denounced those accusing the police of making strategic errors as ³nay-sayers.² His comments were part of a sustained offensive by the police, government and much of the media to quash renewed demands for an independent inquiry into the July 7 bombings, after the trial heard fresh evidence that two of the ringleaders of the explosions on London Underground trains and a bus‹Mohammed Sidique Khan and Shehzad Tanweer‹had been known to the intelligence services at least five months before they made their attack. On May 1, survivors and relatives of those killed on July 7 delivered a letter to the Home Office calling for an ³independent and impartial public inquiry² into the attack. Prime Minister Tony Blair rejected their demand and insisted MI5 was doing an ³amazing job.² An inquiry would only divert resources from the fight against terrorism, Blair claimed. In an unprecedented move, MI5 published a reply to criticisms on its website, ³Rumours and Reality‹the facts behind the myths,² whilst the press rolled into action to defend the intelligence agency. The Guardian editorialised, ³An inquiry might rake over old failings, not current ones. It could add to the pressures on those policing terrorism. Carried out in private, it might not even do much to reassure the public....² Whilst acknowledging that mistakes had been made, the editorial continued, ³A one-off inquiry into an investigation that succeeded much more than it failed is not the way to make it better.² Writing in the Independent, Deborah Orr Deborah complained, ³The last thing we need, in the wake of the Operation Crevice verdict, is an elaborate inquiry, which would simply be another way of throwing money away.² In the same newspaper, Howard Jacobson argued, ³I wonder how many of those calling for this inquiry were busy telling us not all that long ago that there was no terrorism for our security services to police. An invention of our respective governments‹Blair¹s and Bush¹s‹the lot of it.² Disparaging the questions raised over the real purpose of Bush and Blair¹s ³war on terror,² he continued, ³is that a Œsorry¹ I hear amid the accusations that we have not been sufficiently vigilant? A sorry from those who thought vigilance was uncalled for and sinister?² Such a pose of self-serving triumphalism will do nothing to quell the questions raised by the Old Bailey hearing, and their grave implications for democratic rights. Most damning of all is the revelation that MI5 was well aware of the identities of several of those of went on to carry out the July 7 bombings and their involvement in terror activities, but decided not to follow them up. The trial heard that, several months before the accused were arrested, police had been tipped off by the storage unit as to the quantity of fertiliser being held on its premises. Having replaced the fertiliser with a harmless substance, a plainclothes police officer was stationed at the reception whilst hidden surveillance cameras recorded everyone attending the facility. ³Operation Crevice² was therefore intended as a massive information-gathering exercise. The court heard how the probe uncovered 55 individuals known to have associated with the plotters, of whom 15 were considered ³essential² targets. Yet, Khan and Tanweer were ³parked up² with the remainder‹i.e. treated as non-urgent cases. This is despite MI5 recording meetings between Khan and Tanweer on four occasions in 2004 with Omar Khyam, described at the Old Bailey as the ringleader of the fertiliser plot. The court also heard how Khan was amongst several of the accused that had attended a terrorist camp in the Afghan border region in July 2003, and that anti-terror police had investigated two cars linked to him, five months before the July 7 bombings. Yet, despite having his name and address, no follow-up was made. MI5 claims that this was because the two had not been heard discussing terrorist acts and ³appeared as petty fraudsters.² But in transcripts of bugged conversations played in court, Khan is heard discussing attending a terror training camp and conducting financial scams in preparation for what his co-conspirator describes as ³a one-way ticket.² Neither has MI5 been able to explain why it omitted sending surveillance pictures of Khan to the FBI during its interrogation of the so-called Al Qaeda ³supergrass² (informer) Mohammed Junaid Babar, who gave evidence for the prosecution. MI5¹s claims regarding Khan and Tanweer are, moreover, contradicted by a 37-page document compiled for the Crown Prosecution Service, which was revealed by the Sunday Times on May 6. According to the newspaper, the CPS document states that ³MI5 surveillance showed the pair [Khan and Tanweer] Œwere concerned with intended terrorist activity¹ when they met with a gang planning a bombing at the Bluewater shopping centre in Kent.² It also states that Kahn was ³identified² six months before he carried out the July 7 bombings. It is proof that Khan and Tanweer had been identified by the intelligence services months before July 7 that has particularly angered survivors of the London explosions. At the time, then-Home Secretary Charles Clarke had claimed those involved were ³clean skins²‹i.e., unknown to the police and intelligence services‹whilst Blair told parliament, ³I know of no intelligence specific enough² to have prevented the attacks. The Times notes that only last week, current Home Secretary John Reid had told MPs that that ³neither Khan nor Tanweer were Œknown¹ to the security services until after July 7. He later said police and security services had Œno records on them.¹ ³ The Times added that the CPS document ³argues that meetings between the two men and the fertiliser plotters in 2004 were so significant they should have been brought to the jury¹s attention.² Evidence that MI5 had been able to identify Khan and Tanweer has also led to accusations that it withheld information from parliament¹s Intelligence and Security Committee. The ISC report issued in May 2006 stated that none of the July 7 bombers had been ³named and listed² as potential terror threats. It stated that although MI5 had come across Khan and Tanweer ³on the peripheries² of other investigative operations, their identities were unknown. The ISC was also not shown surveillance photographs of the meetings between Khan, Tanweer and Omar Khyam. Security officials have said this was not necessary, as members of the ISC were aware of the links. ³The reason they were not shown them is because it didn¹t add to the facts. If they had felt the need to ask to see them, they would have asked,² one source was reported as stating. The ISC is a toothless body, appointed by the prime minister and responsible directly to him. It is for this reason, and to divert demands for a more far-ranging independent inquiry, that Blair established his 2005 investigation. It is for the same reason that the ISC has meekly said it will ³look again² at information revealed during the trial. In addition to the damning evidence of MI5¹s foreknowledge of Khan and Tanweer¹s involvement in terror plots, the fertiliser trial has raised many other fundamental questions. In the same leader cited above, the Guardian revealed that ³restrictive limits on reporting² over the last 13 months meant that the ³story of Operation Crevice...will come as a surprise to almost everyone outside the narrow circle of politicians and security professionals who‹together with those present in court‹were aware that one of the most remarkable trials in British criminal history had been underway.² On what grounds were such restrictions imposed, and for whose purposes? The Guardian does not say. In a separate article, the newspaper also noted that the ISC¹s 2006 findings were ³written under restrictions to avoid prejudicing the trial of the fertiliser bomb plotters.² In other words, the findings of the only ³investigation² into July 7 were themselves subject to even further restrictions. Then there are the allegations made during the trial that Britain¹s security services had sanctioned the torture in Pakistan of one of the accused, Salahuddin Amin. A British citizen, Amin was arrested and interrogated in Pakistan for 10 months, during which he alleges he was beaten and flogged, threatened with an electric drill, and forced to listen to the screams of others being abused before confessing to his involvement in a bomb-making conspiracy. He has accused MI5 of directing his abuse‹alleging that he was visited on at least 10 occasions during his detention by MI5 officers, and that one of his interrogations may have been filmed for Britain¹s security forces who were simultaneously questioning his co-accused in London. Amin was eventually freed in Pakistan, having been told that he had been ³cleared in England² and could leave the country. He was arrested as soon as his plane landed at Heathrow. In court, Amin¹s counsel, Patrick O¹Connor QC‹who is helping prepare a civil action against the British government‹suggested that both sides in the so-called war on terror had come ³to share common standards of illegality and immorality.² What of the role of ³supergrass² Babar, who was given immunity from prosecution in Britain after pleading guilty to terrorism offences in a New York court? Babar said that he faced the death penalty for his role in a conspiracy to kill Pakistan¹s President Pervez Musharraf if he had not collaborated with the FBI. In the US, he also confessed to obtaining ammonium nitrate and aluminium powder for use by the fertiliser plotters, and in court, he testified that he had attended a terrorist training camp in Pakistan in 2003 where he met Khyam, Mahmood, Garcia and Amin. The BBC reported how Babar had been ³well trained² for his role in the trial and had ³memorised his statement to the British police, given to counter-terrorism officers while he was in custody in the US, and knew every date and location in the long story of the conspiracy.² Under questioning, however, ³cracks began to appear in his carefully prepared account,² and at the end of his evidence, ³the jury themselves sent a note² asking for him to explain again key details of his testimony. For their part, defence lawyers have accused Babar of being a double agent. Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Centre for Research on Globalization. To become a Member of Global Research The CRG grants permission to cross-post original Global Research articles on community internet sites as long as the text & title are not modified. The source and the author's copyright must be displayed. 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