Watch for women and child bombers, says British police

David Leppard:

TERRORISTS could be preparing to use women and children as suicide bombers in further attacks on trains and other soft targets in London, internal Scotland Yard documents have warned.

Official “stop and search” guidance just issued to thousands of Metropolitan police officers indicates that police fear the bombers may be planning to change their tactics.

“Terrorists will try to use our actions against us and will adapt their methods (use women or even children),” the document states.

The paper contains advice to officers exercising their powers under section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000. The rules govern the conduct of the 6,000 officers who have been deployed across the capital to stop a possible third terror cell following on from the July 7 atrocities and the failed July 21 attacks.

The paper was released this weekend on the order of Sir Ian Blair, the Metropolitan police commissioner, in an effort to defuse the row over claims that police are singling out Asian and black men during street searches.

Under the rules, Met officers have been told to avoid “racial profiling” and “not to focus on specific groups”. The advice adds: “Be aware that there is no specific racial, ethnic, sexual or religious profile for terrorists.”

Blair insisted the new advice was not dictated by political correctness. “Everything’s got to be intelligence-based,” he said.

“If we said the only people to be searched are young males who are of Caribbean or Asian or north African appearance it would be handing the objectives to the terrorists and they would immediately change their tactics.”

He was talking after Ian Johnston, chief constable of the British Transport police, which guards the Tube and train network, suggested his officers had been told to single out Muslim and African men as the most likely terrorist suspects. “We should not waste time searching old white ladies,” he said.

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