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Special Branch: MI5: Terrorism LeaksThis Sunday witnessed a number of newspaper articles concerning anti-terrorist activities. Their subject matter appears to be true but the most upsetting issue is how such information reached the public domain. In short, it is a self evident fact that our security services are no longer secure.Neither the ‘Menezes’ nor the ‘clueless MI5’ stories reassure the public. But – one cannot but be impressed by the ‘spin’ issued by MI5 this Sunday – as in found in the Times 2006-01-30 below – to allay public fears raised by the Sunday Times article. Taken from News of the
World 2006-01-29
Scandal of faked Menezes evidence BLUNDER COPS IN REPORT COVER-UP Undercover police forged vital surveillance evidence to cover up a crucial blunder that led to innocent Brazilian Jean Charles de Menezes being gunned down as a suspected Tube suicide bomber. A logbook detailing the electrician's last movements was altered by Special Branch (SB) officers to try and hide the fact that they had wrongly identified him as a terror suspect before he was shot seven times in the head at Stockwell station. Their deliberate cover-up meant the blame for de Menezes' death would be pinned on Yard bosses and the armed cops who actually fired the bullets - leaving them open to murder charges. Amazingly it was not until 14 hours after the log was altered that under-fire Scotland Yard Commissioner Sir Ian Blair was finally informed his officers had killed the wrong man. The shock revelations are contained in the Independent Police Complaints Commission report into the shooting, which happened in the aftermath of last year's 21/7 Tube bomb attempts Suicide The secret report, delivered 10 days ago, says the decision to send in an armed team to kill the wrongly-selected suspect came only after a positive identification by an undercover SB surveillance team. One officer mistakenly reported that de Menezes was alleged wanted terrorist Hussein Osman — being hunted for a "failed suicide bombing" in the capital the previous day. But, the report reveals, once it was realised an innocent man had been killed, the SB log was altered to show that NO positive ID was made. A Whitehall source said: "It says the log was actually tampered with in a major way. In particular the words AND and NOT were inserted, so it read 'AND it was NOT Osman' rather than 'it WAS Osman'." The shock report suggests this was done at a debriefing meeting at eight o'clock that evening — about 10 hours after de Menezes, 27, was shot. It was at the debrief, attended by the five-strong surveillance team and other SB officers, that the log was produced, before being locked away. A source said: "As in every such operation, the surveillance team were telling a control car what they're doing, what they're seeing. "That was then all written down in a logbook by another SB officer listening to the team's radio messages. "One of the surveillance team got close to the target and, the report says, positively identified him as Osman. That ID had to be a significant factor in the subsequent disaster." The source said that at the evening debriefing, officers were allowed to check the log and, as is normal procedure, amend any errors. If they do so, they must explain in writing why, then clearly sign it. "The alteration wasn't signed. It was blatant, it was clumsy," revealed the source. And the IPCC report says damningly: "This looks like an attempt to try and distance SB from the decision (to shoot de Menezes)". The source said: "The forgery potentially made their colleagues back at the Yard, and particularly firearms officer colleagues, liable to be put in the dock for murder." The surveillance team all deny making the change. It is thought the two officers who shot de Menezes have been told they will not face charges. The pressures on the day, says the report, were worsened because of a severe shortage of firearms officers in the terror-gripped capital. When the decision was made to intercept who they thought was Osman trying to board a train at Stockwell, a unit based some distance away in Vauxhall was called in. It raced to the scene to get there in time — and that hurry didn't help the situation, says the report. Taken from the Times
2006-01-30
Police tampered with log on dead Brazilian 'suspect' Undercover detectives altered a surveillance log to avoid blame for the death of Jean Charles de Menezes in a bungled counter-terrorist operation, according to police watchdogs. The disclosure, in a report by the Independent Police Complaints Commission, puts fresh pressure on Sir Ian Blair, the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, and his officers over the shooting. Mr de Menezes, 27, was shot seven times in the head by a firearms team on a train at Stockwell Underground station on July 22 last year as police hunted for terrorists who had tried to attack the London transport system the day before. Police sources say that the report, which is being studied by the Crown Prosecution Service, shows that a Special Branch logbook describing Mr de Menezes’s last movements had been altered to hide that he had wrongly been identified as a suspect. Mr de Menezes was shadowed by a Special Branch team as he headed to Stockwell station. They believed that they were following a deadly attacker and radioed another officer with reports on what was happening. He kept a log. One of the team identified Mr de Menezes as the terrorist suspect. This was noted, although the IPCC also found that elsewhere in the log there were “degrees of doubt” raised by the team. The log was changed at a debriefing meeting at 8pm that night, about ten hours after the shooting. Police were still saying that Mr de Menezes might have terrorist links. The log originally said that there was a positive identification but the word “not” was then added. None of the radio traffic during the operation was recorded, which meant that blame for the events leading to Mr de Menezes’s death could have fallen on the commanders and controllers rather than the team. The IPCC team is said to have been alerted by a whistle-blower. A scientific technique for checking changes in documents showed the change that had been made. The team has denied changing the log. Later that night the Anti- Terrorist Branch SO13 finally cleared Mr de Menezes but the IPCC found that the Commissioner was not told until 10.30am the next morning, more than 24 hours after the death. The delay will raise more questions about the handling of the operation and its tragic conclusion and why Sir Ian was left in ignorance for so long. The report is said to make uncomfortable reading for police, drawing attention to a string of errors. There are questions not only about identification but also communications, what orders were issued and by whom, and who did what. Mr de Menezes’s family last night called for Sir Ian to reconsider his position in light of the disclosure. “It seems that Sir Ian Blair was not aware of any of this information for quite a while following Jean’s death, which does raise certain questions about how in touch he was with the operation,” Asad Rehman, a spokesman for the family, said. “Sir Ian Blair is ultimately responsible for the safety of people in London and this country. It seems he didn’t have his eye on the ball.” Ten officers have been named in the IPCC report as facing possible charges. They include a senior officer, a middle-ranking officer and junior officers involved in the operation. The most senior is Commander Cressida Dick, the officer empowered to order officers to open fire under the rules of Operation Kratos, a special set of rules for dealing with the threat from suicide bombers. She denies that she gave the key codeword. Yesterday the IPCC refused to comment on the report, which has been with the CPS for ten days and is now being examined with a file of evidence by counsel. taken from Xinhuanet
UK
police officers accused of misreporting in wrongful shooting
An inquiry into the police mistaken shooting of an innocent Brazilian man has concluded that some of the officers involved misreported what had happened in a bid to evade blame for the incident, British media reported at the weekend. Jean Charles de Menezes, 27, was killed in a south London underground station when he was mistaken for a suicide bomber on July 22. The Brazilian electrician was shot seven times in the head by armed anti-terror officers. Results of the inquiry by the Independent Police Complaints Commission have not been released. But Sky News TV and the News of the World newspaper reported on Saturday and Sunday respectively that the inquiry has concluded that one division of the police involved filed a false log report about the shooting in an effort to escape blame. The Special Branch surveillance police team first wrote in its log that it had informed the police involved in the shooting that they were chasing Hussein Osman, one of the suspected failed suicide bombers on July 21, Sky News and News of the World said. But the Special Branch later altered that log to say it had informed the police on the ground that it didn't know who they were chasing, the TV station and the newspaper said. The wrongful shooting occurred one day after abortive bombings in London and two weeks after 52 innocent people were killed in suicide bombings in three underground stations and one double-decker bus. Taken from News 24 South
Africa
MI5 'clueless' about bombings London - British spies have acknowledged major gaps in their knowledge of the July 7 London transit bombings, a newspaper reported on Sunday. The Sunday Times said a leaked memo acknowledged that the domestic intelligence service MI5 had learned little about how the attacks were planned or whether the al-Qaeda terrorist network was involved. "We know little about what three of the bombers did in Pakistan, when attack planning began, how and when the attackers were recruited, the extent of any external direction or assistance and the extent and role of any wider network," said the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre memo, which the newspaper said was prepared for Prime Minister Tony Blair and other ministers. The Times said the report was delivered in October, but sources had said "the situation has changed little since then." Blair's office refused to comment on the document. Four suicide bombers killed 52 commuters when they detonated bombs on three subway trains and a bus on July 7. It was the deadliest attack in London since World War II The memo also said it was not clear whether the July 7 bombs and a failed attack two weeks later were connected. No one was hurt on July 21 when explosives aboard three subway trains and a bus failed to detonate. Spy chiefs admitted "we still do not know whether we are dealing with an orchestrated campaign or coincidental/copycat attacks," the newspaper said. "Whilst investigations are progressing, there remain significant gaps in our knowledge," the newspaper quoted the report as saying. The intelligence services have uncovered increasing evidence that an al-Qaeda mastermind was behind the July 7 suicide bombings in London. Despite a leaked secret report dated last October, three months after the attacks, which indicated that little had been learnt of the background to the plot, more recent discoveries have produced firmer links between the four British bombers and al-Qaeda. The biggest question for MI5 and police has been whether the London bombings were conceived and planned entirely in Britain or whether there was outside influence, some form of mastermind supplying expertise, money and planning. Security sources said for the first time yesterday that the intelligence services were closer to answering the key questions, providing evidence of a foreign connection, linking the London bombers to terrorists in Pakistan. The results of the six-month inquiry, which has included visits to Pakistan by MI5 officers and police counter-terrorist specialists, will be laid out in a detailed report in April by the parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee, headed by Paul Murphy, the former Northern Ireland Secretary. Security sources said yesterday that “enormous progress” had been made since October, when, according to the document published in The Sunday Times, there were still huge gaps in intelligence. Sources said that the report was based on an analysis of the facts and at that time there were no real clues about a foreign connection other than the known visits to Pakistan by two of the suicide bombers. |
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