Downing Street Says » Al Qaeda/Terror Legislation

Asked how many Al Qaeda trained operatives did the Prime Minister believed were "at large" in the UK, the Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman (PMOS) told the journalists what the Prime Minister had said both last week during an interview, and the week before during PMQs. The Prime Minister had said that there were several hundred people who were of concern to the police because of suspicions about terrorist intent. That remained the position, and therefore, what Sir John Stevens had said did not come as any surprise. The PMOS said it was a subject that was not just of concern here, but also throughout Europe and the rest of the world, and this was why there would be a representative at the conference on Terrorism in Madrid this week. What this underlined was that the threat from Al Qaeda and from other terrorist groups was very real, and therefore the precautions that had to be taken against those threats had to match the nature and extent of the threat.

Asked what happened if the Government was not able to get its latest anti terror legislation through, and was there a "Plan B", the PMOS replied that the Government remained determined to get the legislation through. The PMOS had said last week that the Government’s position remained that it thought it had struck the right balance, and that position had not changed at all since then. Therefore, the Government was determined to get this position through. The PMOS reminded people that if the police and security services had information that they believed an individual was involved in terrorism of some kind, but they did not have concrete evidence, the choices were either leaving the suspect at large or detaining them. With the new control orders, there would be a range of measures, which would be an improvement on the current situation.

Put that the Home Office had said that their assessment of the legislation meant that if it did go through, only twenty people would be subject to the control orders, not hundreds, as the Prime Minister and Sir John Stevens had said, the PMOS said that as he had told people last week, these individuals were of varying concern. Therefore, the response had to equally be varying and flexible between monitoring surveillance or other measures. The PMOS also emphasised that the control orders themselves varied in the restrictions that could be applied to an individual – from monitoring to house arrest. What was needed was a flexible system that was capable of responding to the varying degree of risk as identified by the police and security services. The PMOS said people needed to reflect on the fact that we had now had the chairman of the ACPO committee on terrorism saying he believed these measures were necessary. Sir Ian Blair, the current Commissioner had also said that he thought the control orders could be implemented. Sir John Stevens, the previous Commissioner, had also underlined what he saw as the real nature of the threat. There was a threat, and we needed to be flexible in our response to that threat.

Put to him that the Prime Minister had commented in a Scottish Newspaper that he would not "rule out putting control orders on those who protested about the G8 Summit", the PMOS said he had not seen the precise quote. He reiterated that it depended entirely upon the nature of the threat which any individual was judged to pose. Therefore, if someone did pose a terrorist threat, then we had to respond to that threat. If we had intelligence but we could not convert it into hard evidence, then we had to have the ability to impose controls. The PMOS said it was in terms of the nature of threat, and the police would have to have the range of implements to use, depending on the nature of the threat.

Asked what happened to the Belmarsh people once they had been released from custody, the PMOS said he could not comment on individual cases. He said that the Government must have the range of powers that the police and security services needed, and Sir Ian Blair had underlined that they were workable to deal with the nature of the threat. We would act on police advice.

Asked if there would an extension of the sitting, as Thursday was the last day for any terror bill debates, the PMOS said those were matters for the business managers.

Asked if the Government had sought a draft order to renew the existing legislation, the PMOS replied the journalist should speak to the Home Office, as he was not aware they had done so.

3 Comments »

But the PM, Police, MI5, MI6 don’t know who the real threats are – they only know about the few who have been ‘careless’ and managed to be identified.

Once identified a person ceases to be such a danger – ‘cos one can monitor them.

Now one of the biggest mistakes that folk make is to assume that terrorists are stupid [because some of them will die for their cause] – however, it is quite feasible that the 200 (maybe) suspects are decoys to absorb the resources of the security forces – whilst the unknown dedicated and well trained few get on with the job of planning and executing their ‘terror’.

I have great fun scaring the sh*t out of friends explaining some of the easy but spectacular things that a terrorist could do – so lets get real – if there are 200 terrorists in the UK today then they are exceptionally unimaginative and lazy to have not yet acted. However if there are a ‘few’ real terrorists in the UK and they have been planing for several years then we can expect a real "newsworthy" event when they do get active.

None of this political crap addresses the need for enough security forces and police to detect the ‘few’.

Legislation is cheap – real ‘feet on the street’ costs money

What is the debate about? ……. cheap legislation,

nuff said.
Comment by Roger Huffadine — 7 Mar 2005 on 11:11 pm | Link
And already we are blurring the lines between "a very select few" people, and "hundreds" of people. Thankfully the other house has obviously more common sense than the idiots actually running the country.
Comment by PapaLazzzaru — 8 Mar 2005 on 3:12 am | Link
And let’s get real for a second here. Firstly, John Stevens is blowing hot air. He doesn’t KNOW there are 200 Al Qaeda operatives in this country. If he is going to go on record and say that, he might as well go on record to say he’s really not too sure exactly what Al Qaeda actually is. And if he does, then he is very stupid for continuing the scaremongering the government has started, because he should know better.

Al Qaeda is little more than a slightly more organised framework for communication and (sometimes) transfer of cash to various groups than has always existed. Terrorist groups have always collaborated – look only recently at IRA people running around Colombia. Al Qaeda is merely one of many frameworks which facilitates various levels of support for the relatively few groups who come up with plans which are actually workable. These groups are not necessarily anything directly to do with Al Qaeda – the 9/11 hijackers were only distantly linked to Osama Bin Laden and the hardcore of Al Qaeda; and even then the hardcore does little more than act as a figurehead for recruitment and to point people to the right place for training or contacts. And then, a lot of the "training camps" we’ve heard so much about in the past are not in fact Al Qaeda camps (those that did exist at one point in Afghanistan were quickly closed down by the Taliban) but camps in Pakistan, often ran by the Pakistani government & the ISI (the Secret Service, the appointment of whose chief has to be okayed by the CIA) and with the full knowledge of the USA.

Pakistan is, was, and probably always will be, the worlds leading sponsor of terrorism. Not Iran. Or Syria. Or Iraq. Or any other country the USA and puppet B.Liar want to point the finger of expediency at. Closely followed by Saudi Arabia. Both with the full knowledge and tacit blessing of the USA. If our leaders really wanted to "get tough" on terrorism, the first steps are real easy; distance yourself from the real bad guys and stop telling lies to your own people. Problem is, they don’t – I could go on about the reasons but people will only listen when it’s too late.
Comment by PapaLazzzaru — 8 Mar 2005 on 3:34 am | Link

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» Monday, March 7, 2005

Al Qaeda/Terror Legislation

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