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Jane’s Sentinel Security Assessment - UK: Internal Affairs
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| 07 July 2005 |
London, as the capital city of a major ally in the "war on terrorism" and as a symbol of world finance and Western culture, is especially vulnerable to an attack. The Minister of London, Nick Raynsford, set up a London Resilience Cabinet Committee composed of the Mayor and all of London's key services, as well as an inter-agency London Resilience Team (LRT), which were tasked with a comprehensive assessment of London's preparedness for a terrorist attack.
The London Underground
Difficult environments like the Underground are of particular concern. The high number and density of commuters using the London Underground makes the latter an attractive target for suicide bombers or an attack using a chemical, biological or radioactive weapon, as in the sarin gas attack on the Tokyo underground in 1999. For the same reason, although there are more than 570 British Transport Police Officers operating (February 2004), the London Underground is a particularly difficult site to protect. Tests were held in 2004 using new CCTV cameras that can detect unusual events on a platform, such as suspect packages.
Airports and other key sites
London's five airports, Heathrow, Gatwick, Stanstead, City and Luton, are also at high risk, and the security measures have been significantly increased at all five of them. Blair has authorised the deployment of army reservists to protect airports, sea ports and other key sites such as nuclear power stations. In early 2003, as a response both to intelligence warnings and growing tensions over Iraq, the security services strengthened the military presence at Heathrow Airport and later placed concrete blocks outside of the House of Commons as protection from a car/truck bomb. It has also been highlighted that terrorists might use the Thames and other waterways to transport themselves undetected. The Metropolitan Police has therefore introduced more high-speed launches to enable them to patrol more effectively.
Central London
Amid fears that tourist landmarks and government departments could be under threat, security chiefs recommended in June 2004 the establishment of a 'sterile security zone' in central London that could extend from Trafalgar Square to Millbank, where MI5 has its headquarters. The leader of the House, Peter Hain, and Commons Speaker Michael Martin were presented with an interim report on security at Westminster by anti-terrorist experts. The report recommended specific security measures for the chamber itself, such as sealing off the chamber behind a "bubble" of security screens. It is thought that a further, more comprehensive, report will recommend expensive road closures around key ministries including the Department of Health, Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Ministry of Defence as well as Parliament Square and Whitehall.
However, emergency planners admit that Britain could not cope with a major attack on the scale of the Madrid bombings. Patrick Cunningham, president of the Emergency Planning Society, complained that emergency services suffer from a huge lack of equipment and staff training. Moreover, co-operation between national governments and agencies in Europe on tracking the threat posed by terrorists was poor before the March 2004 Madrid attacks, and will improve only slowly.
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