Downing Street Says » Spanish bomb attacks

Asked for a reaction to speculation this morning that Al Qaida might have been responsible for yesterday’s bomb attacks in Madrid, the Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman (PMOS) said that as we had stated last night, we believed this was a matter which was best left to the Spanish authorities to assess. We had no reason to second-guess their judgement and we were content to leave it up to them. Obviously, if we could provide any assistance, we would do so. The PMOS added that Denis MacShane would be travelling to Madrid today to take part in the demonstrations there later this evening. Asked if the assistance we were offering to Spain related to intelligence, the PMOS said that we never commented on intelligence issues. Asked if any British policemen were being sent to Madrid, the PMOS said not as far as he was aware.

Asked if Downing Street had been in contact with the Spanish authorities in the last twenty-four hours, the PMOS said that the Prime Minister had spoken directly to Prime Minister Aznar by phone yesterday afternoon. Prime Minister Aznar had said that he was very grateful for the solidarity and support which the UK had expressed yesterday morning. The two leaders had then had a discussion about the attacks and the question of attribution. Asked if the Prime Minister was intending to speak to Mr Aznar again today, the PMOS said no. In our experience, it was important to balance the need to express solidarity and offer support with the need to let the Spanish authorities deal with the aftermath of yesterday’s outrage. Obviously we were in regular contact with the Spanish Government at many levels in any event, and would continue to be so at this time.

Questioned as to whether the intelligence services in the UK were examining whether the attacks in Madrid had any ramifications for a possible terror attack in Britain, the PMOS said that we continued to make our own assessments about the security threat to the UK on a daily basis, and responded accordingly. He repeated that we had no reason to second-guess the Spanish authorities’ assessment of the situation. Asked if he was indicating that the Government had no plans to step up internal security measures in the light of the attacks yesterday, the PMOS pointed out that the UK’s level of security was already high. He repeated that assessments were made on a daily basis.

Asked if he had any further information about British casualties, the PMOS said that we were aware of one British national, currently residing in Spain, who was still in hospital. She had been visited by Consular staff.

Asked why a Minister of Cabinet rank would not be representing the British Government at the demonstration in Madrid this evening in the light of the fact that the French Prime Minister and German Chancellor would be attending, the PMOS said that Denis MacShane had confirmed on Newsnight last night that he would be attending. It was highly possible that other Ministers would want to go as well. As Prime Minister Aznar had said yesterday, Spain was in no doubt at all that Britain stood together with the Spanish people in outrage at yesterday’s events. We stood shoulder to shoulder with them in terms of the way we viewed terrorism and in condemning those who had carried out the appalling attacks. Asked if the Prime Minister was considering whether to attend the demonstration, the PMOS said that the Prime Minister was unable to do so. However, Dr MacShane, and possibly other Ministers, would be going. He repeated that Spain was in absolutely no doubt about where we stood on the issue of terrorism. Asked if the fact that senior figures from other countries would be attending had forced a rethink on UK attendance, the PMOS said no. Dr MacShane had told Newsnight last night that he would be attending. If other Ministers were available to go, no doubt they would also want to do so. Asked if Dr MacShane’s announcement had taken Downing Street by surprise, the PMOS said no.

4 Comments »

when I first heard about the attacks I thought That it was ETA, hey it still very well could be, but the main thing is, I thought that if it was ETA then it would be the Popular party back into power in Spain, and if it turned out to be an Islamic group then the Socialist Party would get in.

Well today Spain has a new prime minister, and this happened with the main suspect being al-Qaeda.
My flatmates all owe me a fiver over this one.
For those of you with suspicious minds like me, I would have a good look at what everyone has to loose and gain with who did these attacks.
Comment by Dikkie — 15 Mar 2004 on 9:53 am | Link
So….is the real winner in the Spanish election Al-Qaida? And if you think so, aren’t you really scared?
Comment by graceunderpressure — 15 Mar 2004 on 1:00 pm | Link
Various people, including Chris Brooke and Matthew Turner, have argued that the reason for the "surprise" result of the Spanish general election is that, after a national catastrophe on the scale of the Madrid bombings, turnout rose. A rise in turnout generally leads to increased support for parties of the left (certainly this appears to be true from recent polling data in this country). So it’s not necessarily true that people rejected Aznar because they didn’t like his Iraq policy, or his government’s spin, or whatever; it might simply have been that, by making people care enough to vote, the bombings led naturally to support for a party of the left. Cf.
<a href="http://mattysblog.blogspot.com/2004_03_01_mattysblog_archive.html#107935413937903469">http://mattysblog.blogspot.com/2004_03_01_mattysblog_archive.html#107935413937903469</a>
<a href="http://users.ox.ac.uk/~magd1368/weblog/2004_03_01_archive.html#107934979618555901">http://users.ox.ac.uk/~magd1368/weblog/2004_03_01_archive.html#107934979618555901</a>
Comment by Chris Lightfoot — 15 Mar 2004 on 3:05 pm | Link
when i originally read about the ties between al-qaida and the train bombings i was taken back by the irony. the war trio broken apart. backfire on Aznar. it’s good to see that the people in spain saw through the attacks by the people they were opposing war with and didn’t let the government put them into a state of fear. which is what it seems that tactic was, for political gain, justification, and instilling fear. media is spreading so fast but still it was a step behind. maybe the last attempt to beat the media. now it seems like they are flooding everything before it happens. the info that suposedly took responsibilty for the attacks mentioned that al-qaida was 90% done with it’s next plan for america, i think i read it as,"the wings of black death. then ms.rice talking about election time warnings, what about mr.bush throwing in our faces the misinformation leading to the WMD. for years now american soliders and special ops units have been preparing themselves and americans for a chemical warfare type of attack. by praticing martial law drills in american cities with help from armed forces from around the world and even the citizens of the town including the children. who help out and give the soliders tips on the whereabouts of the mock suspected terrorists in the communities. it seems like its being setup for a good slap in the american faces. to all those who oppose the way our American government takes care of them. to the people who question whether the goverment is always doing whats best. i’m sure that during the time mr. bush was having problems getting the go-ahead to go through with inspections for WMD all over the news, somebody would be able to spread those out and put them to everybodies gain. are they already in the US? what better lesson for the american people than to show how terrible it is to not stand behind our goverments decisions. because it is evident that our government is never wrong. even though they have made it seem like a little blooper, i feel the government will find a way to correct that way of thinking. even in mr.bush’s Q&A with the press the other day he clearly set the tone that things happen the way they do and the american government will always do the right thing in all situations. But right for who or what. the 911 hearings and investigations. it’s all the same people playing together. my quick evaluation is that coming up around election time all this orchestrated madness will come full circle. martial law might be in some kind of effect and maybe we won’t even need to have an election. a serious organizing of who is who in america. or of who is left. if you want everybody to get along, america’s way is to punish and teach lessons to those who don’t agree. specially just within our own country. but with the numbers of opposition climbing i guess you do what has to be done. so many levels of what is really going on, i think this coming election for us will give alot of answers and set the tone for the relationship between the people and it’s government. but answers that futher complicate and seperate the relationship. this election will be one to remember.
Comment by Kevin Smith — 19 Apr 2004 on 2:05 pm | Link

RSS feed for comments on this post.

Post a public comment

Name (required)
E-mail (required)
(You must give an email address, but it will not be displayed to the public.)
Website
(You may give your website, and it will be displayed to the public.)

Comments:

This is not a way of contacting the Prime Minister. If you would like to contact the Prime Minister, go to the 10 Downing Street official site.

Privacy note: Shortly after posting, your name and comment will be displayed on the site. This means that people searching for your name on the Internet will be able to find and read your comment.

Original PMOS briefings are © Crown Copyright. Crown Copyright material is reproduced with the permission of the Controller of HMSO and the Queen's Printer for Scotland. Click-use licence number C02W0004089. Material is reproduced from the original 10 Downing Street source, but may not be the most up-to-date version of the briefings, which might be revised at the original source. Users should check with the original source in case of revisions. Comments are © Copyright contributors. Everything else is © Copyright Downing Street Says.

» Friday, March 12, 2004

Spanish bomb attacks

4 Comments »

Post a public comment

Search

Supported by

Recent Briefings

Archives

Links

Syndicate (RSS/XML)

Credits

Enquiries