REMEMBRANCE TERROR PLOT

Armed police arrest four in swoop on suspected Islamist cell

FOUR Islamist terror suspects were being held by police last night amid fears of a Remembrance Sunday gun plot. Armed officers seized the men following months of surveillance and ahead of events honouring the nation’s war dead tomorrow.

Police had already stepped up security after a terrorist shot a soldier guarding a war memorial at Canada’s parliament.

And a ring of steel will be thrown around Whitehall tomorrow as the Queen leads events at the Cenotaph marking the centenary of the start of the First World War.

Although police would not discuss whether the suspects had a specific target, the timing of the raids raised fears of a Remembrance Day outrage.

Islamic State militants have called on ‘self-starter’ followers to target high-profile commemorative events. The suspects, aged 19 to 27, were being ques- tioned last night on suspicion of preparing terrorist acts.

Police marksmen arrested the youngest suspect on Thursday night at the home he shares with his mother in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire. He is said to have recently returned from Pakistan.

In an unusual move, the eldest suspect was stopped at gunpoint in his car in Southall, west London. The other two were arrested in Hounslow and Uxbridge and searches were taking place in Greenford and Hayes, also in west London.

The use of armed officers for the arrests suggests police chiefs fear the suspects may have acquired weapons. None were found however. The Metropolitan Police said the operation involved its counterterrorism command, MI5 agents and officers from other constabularies.

The home of Yousaf Syed, the 19-yearold suspect, had been raided before – in April during an investigation into potential jihadists. Another man arrested in that operation complained his passport was seized by the Home Office to stop him travelling to the Middle East.

Neighbours of Syed said he lives with his 41-year-old mother Somia, who works

as ground crew for an airline. One said he had had ‘several run-ins’ with the ‘angry’ teenager. When he challenged the teenager’s mother, she told him: ‘He’s young and he’s just discovered his faith.’

The neighbour said the teenager recently grew a full beard and began wearing traditional Muslim dress.

Another resident said officers removed items from the garden shed as forensics experts combed the house and garden.

Two other addresses in the town were being searched, including a rented flat and a £300,000 house apparently occupied by Syed’s aunt.

High Wycombe’s remembrance parade is due to take place at 10.30am tomorrow in the high street before proceeding to All Saints Church. It attracts large crowds, in part due to the proximity of the town to RAF High Wycombe in nearby Naphill.

A large contingent of personnel from the base, which is the home of the RAF’s headquarters air command, traditionally marches with veterans and other community groups. Germaine Lindsay, who killed 26 people when he detonated a bomb on the Piccadilly Line in the 7/7 attacks, has links to High Wycombe.

He was married to Samantha Lewthwaite – who has found notoriety as the White Widow terrorist in eastern Africa – and the pair lived in Aylesbury, a Bucks town close to High Wycombe.

There are growing concerns that British jihadists fighting in Syria and Iraq will

‘Terror threat to Parliament’

return to this country and carry out acts of terrorism. But detectives do not believe there is any direct link between the latest arrests and fanatics in the Middle East.

David Cameron ordered a security review last month after the Canadian attack. Heads of MI5 and Scotland Yard held talks over the terror threat to Parliament and other landmarks.

Just a few weeks ago police were warned to be on their guard over fears they could become targets. In London, frontline officers were warned of intelligence that suggested terrorists aspired to abduct and murder a policeman. In August the national terror-threat level was raised from substantial to severe, meaning a terrorist attack was ‘highly likely’.

A Metropolitan Police spokesman said the men were being held on suspicion of ‘being concerned in the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism’.

He said the arrests were part of an ongoing investigation by the Met’s counter terrorism command, colleagues from other forces and MI5.

He added: ‘They have all been taken to police stations in central London and remain in custody. Two of the entries to premises were assisted by firearms officers. No shots were fired.’

On Remembrance Sunday in 1987, 11 people were killed and 68 wounded when the IRA bombed the cenotaph in Enniskillen, Northern Ireland. This year’s Armistice Day will be used to mark the centenary of the start of the First World War and the withdrawal of UK troops from Afghanistan.

IN a plea for help, Britain’s most senior police officer, Sir Bernard hogan-howe, says forces are ‘struggling to cope’ with the huge influx of immigrants, many of whom speak little or no english.

expect his remarks to be either ignored by Westminster or condemned. Last week, Ofsted head Sir Michael Wilshaw said schools were under intense pressure from the unprecedented number of incomers. Days later, he was needlessly attacked for his ‘unhelpful’ choice of language by new education Secretary Nicky Morgan, who shows a worrying inclination towards political correctness. Like the three brass monkeys, Nick Clegg, ed Miliband and David Cameron pretend to understand concerns about the social strain caused by mass immigration, but their actions – or lack of them – give the lie to their words.

Significantly, Mr Miliband and Mr Clegg still cling to the view that eu free movement directives are sacrosanct. Meanwhile Mr Cameron, after meeting the disapproval of German Chancellor Angela Merkel, has been forced back to the drawing board on his plan to limit the number of National Insurance numbers given out to eu workers. Only the brave would gamble that – in this battle of wills – it will not be Mr Cameron who blinks first.

Worse, debate on immigration is still censored, disgracefully even by the Tories. Witness Downing Street’s knee-jerk decision to slap down both Defence Secretary Michael Fallon, when he dared to use the word ‘swamped’ in relation to immigration, and Nick Boles for admitting we have little hope of controlling our borders while we remain in the eu.

For their part, the BBC and Left-wing media continue to discount facts about migration they consider inconvenient. The Corporation ignored a powerful article by former Labour home Secretary David Blunkett in the Mail defending Mr Fallon, in which he said those who claim a large influx of migrants does not create problems are living in a ‘fantasy land’. Then, on Wednesday, the BBC gave blanket coverage to a deeply questionable report by university College London that claimed eu workers had contributed £20billion to the public purse – while overlooking figures, buried inside the study, showing non-european migrants had cost the UK a staggering £118billion.

It took the Mail to point out that one of the authors had risibly predicted in 2003 that opening Britain’s borders to workers from eastern europe would increase the population by only 13,000 a year! In Rochester Mr Cameron is expected to lose his second by-election to ukip. Meanwhile, as Labour’s Ian Austin reveals in the Mail today, the source of much of the discontent about ed Miliband is his failure to take a stance on immigration – which has left the party’s MPs in the north west in particular in despair.

Nobody denies – least of all this paper – that properly controlled immigration can be of huge benefit to Britain.

But the refusal of the three main party leaders to address this issue seriously is the main reason behind a growing disenchantment with the entire Westminster political class.