British Police Defuse Car Bomb in London
By Mary Jordan and Debbi Wilgoren
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, June 29, 2007; 9:18 AM

LONDON, June 29 — A Mercedes packed with canisters of gas and nails and apparently rigged to explode was discovered in London’s bustling nightclub and theater district early Friday morning, British police said, and could have caused “significant injury or loss of life” if it had been detonated.

Police defused the bomb and launched a massive investigation into what security officials said was presumed to be an attempted terror attack. The probe will include reviewing huge amounts of footage from the closed-circuit cameras that ring the Haymarket area, close to Piccadilly Circus and Trafalgar Square.

Peter Clarke, the head of London’s anti-terrorist police, said authorities did not have intelligence ahead of time of an attack specifically targeting the area, which would have been crowded with theater-goers, nightclub patrons and tourists. But he said police have disrupted other attacks aimed at nightclubs and involving vehicles filled with flammable liquids.

“It’s too early to speculate” who may have been responsible for the bomb, Clarke said in a news conference. “I’m keeping an entirely open mind about that.”

Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who took office this week, said the incident underscored the need for constant vigilance by both the public and the police. “The first duty of a government is the security of its people,” Brown said. “We face a serious and considerable security threat throughout the country.”

Complete Article
Source: Washington Post
More at: BBC News, USA Today, New York Times

Common Sense Analysis: I think if this shows us anything, it shows that the threat of terrorism is still real to the Western World. I hope we take a lesson from this before they get back over to us.