UK rejects foreign policy link to plot

The British Government today rejected as 8216;8216;dangerous and foolish8217;8217; accusations that its foreign policy heightened the threat of terrorist attacks after police foiled a plot to blow up transatlantic airliners.

The British Government today rejected as 8216;8216;dangerous and foolish8217;8217; accusations that its foreign policy heightened the threat of terrorist attacks after police foiled a plot to blow up transatlantic airliners.

In an open letter to Prime Minister Tony Blair, British Muslim groups and politicians said his policies on issues like Iraq and the Israel-Hizbollah war were putting civilians at increased risk in Britain and elsewhere.

Thirteen months after four British Islamist suicide bombers killed 52 people on London8217;s transport system, British Muslims fear they are being demonised because of extremist militants. 8216;8216;We urge the Prime Minister to redouble his efforts to tackle terror and extremism and change our foreign policy,8217;8217; said the letter, whose signatories included six politicians from Blair8217;s Labour Party.

But ministers were quick to reject claims that their policies had given ammunition to extremists. 8216;8216;No government worth its salt should allow its foreign policy to be dictated under the threat of terrorism,8217;8217; Transport Secretary Douglas Alexander told BBC Radio.

8216;8216;The contemporary challenge we face is how do we maintain the safety of the British public, how do we uphold the perfect right of people to debate these issues but never to succumb to what I think would be both dangerous and foolish.8217;8217;

Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett was equally forthright, saying people who blamed Britain8217;s foreign policy for the terrorism threat were making 8216;8216;the gravest possible error.8217;8217;

8216;8216;This is part of a distorted view of the world, a distorted view of life. Let8217;s put the blame where it belongs: with people who wantonly want to take innocent lives,8217;8217; she said.

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A suspected British al Qaeda operative arrested in Pakistan has been pinpointed as a key person in the plot to blow up as many as 10 transatlantic airliners.

Rashif Rauf was seized by Pakistani intelligence who had monitored his telephone calls and e-mails after a tip-off from Britain8217;s secret services.

8216;8216;He is a British citizen of Pakistani origin. He is an al Qaeda operative with linkages in Afghanistan,8217;8217; Interior Minister Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao said.

Sherpao said his seizure had led to the arrest of 24 suspects in Britain on Thursday who police said were plotting 8216;8216;mass murder on an unimaginable scale8217;8217;.

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Police have been given until Wednesday to question them. One has been released without charge.

Police investigating if fire at mosque was a revenge attack

LONDON: Police said on Saturday they were investigating whether a fire at a mosque in southern England was set in revenge for an alleged plot to blow up aircraft flying to the US. The fire was reported on Saturday at the al-Birr Masjid Mosque in Basingstoke, 80 kms south-west of london. 8216;8216;In this current climate, we cannot rule out the possibility that this incident is related to the recent security threat,8221; said assistant chief constable Steve Watts of Hampshire Police.

40 8216;Islamists8217; held in Italy, most Pakistanis

ROME: Forty suspected Islamists have been arrested in Italy during a police operation launched in the wake of the alleged terrorist plot to blow up US-bound airplanes, the Ansa news agency reported on Saturday. Twenty-eight of the detainees were arrested for violating their residency permits, while 15 search operations had been launched in 8220;foreigners8217;8217; apartments, almost all Pakistanis8221;, the report said. It was not immediately known if any of them had any connection with the alleged plot uncovered by British police to bomb flights between Britain and the US.

Agencies