Police warn of new strikes

London's tube bombers may be linked to the Madrid terrorists, authorities say, as a second British city goes on security alert.

The Islamist terrorist cell that detonated three bombs in 50 seconds on the London Tube is highly organised, possibly linked to last year's Madrid bombing and may strike again, police believe.

More than 20,000 people were evacuated from Birmingham's city centre on Saturday night after a bomb scare that police described as serious.

"The intelligence indicated that the people of Birmingham were in danger last night," West Midlands police chief Constable Paul Scott Lee said. "We have not had this level of threat before."

However, police found no bomb and said the threat had passed.

Syrian-born Mustafa Setmariam Naser, who has been linked to the Madrid bombing, emerged yesterday as a suspect over Thursday's attacks that killed up to 74 people and injured 700.

Spanish security forces reportedly warned Britain four months ago that coded instructions left in a flat used by the Madrid bombers and thought to have been written by Naser had identified Britain as a likely target.

Naser, 47, has lived in Britain and is now thought to be in Iraq.

Government ministers believe the bombers are a "very small number" of individuals who arrived on false passports from mainland Europe or north Africa in the past six months, the Sunday Telegraph reported.

But former Scotland Yard chief Lord Stevens wrote that they "will almost certainly be British born and bred" and it was "dangerous wishful thinking" to believe they were foreigners.>>>continued

And a Downing Street dossier leaked to The Sunday Times reveals the Government's fear that al-Qaeda is recruiting disillusioned, middle-class Muslims in British universities - including socially isolated young men with technical expertise - to carry out terrorist attacks.

http://www.theage.com.au/news/war-on-terror/police-warn-of-new-strikes/2005/07/10/1120934127330.html