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UK bomb police search houses in Northern England

Posted on: Tuesday, 12 July 2005, 08:08 CDT

By Yara Bayoumy

LEEDS, England (Reuters) - British police raided five homes and surrounded another in the northern city of Leeds on Tuesday in the hunt for suspected al Qaeda bombers who killed at least 52 people in London attacks last week.

They were the first reported swoops since last Thursday's explosions and came as frustration mounted at what many grieving relatives feel is slow progress in formally identifying the victims.

Detectives called the house searches "significant" but there was no word of any arrests. Armed officers then surrounded another house amid media reports there had also been a controlled explosion in the area.

Leeds has one of the biggest Muslim populations in Britain.

In May 2001, it was one of a series of northern towns which saw rioting between Asian and white youths blamed on ethnic, religious and racial divisions.

In Brussels on Tuesday, finance minister Gordon Brown pressed the European Union to speed up a raft of measures aimed at cutting off terrorism funding.

In the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on U.S. cities and the March, 2004 Madrid train bombings, the 25-nation bloc agreed to tighten controls on money transfers and seizing the assets of suspects. Brown wants them to move faster.

But top EU Commission official Fabio Colasanti said a proposal from Britain, Ireland, France and Sweden to log all phone and Internet usage for long periods to help combat terrorism is unrealistic.

ANGRY RELATIVES

British Defense Secretary John Reid appealed to anxious relatives for more time. "It is better to get this right than to get it rushed," he said.

Five days after London's worst peacetime bomb attack, Emmanuel Wundowa angrily complained that he first found out on television that his wife Gladys had been identified as a victim.

"Nobody is telling me anything," he said. "If they have got some information that is of benefit to me, why don't they pass it on to me?"

The names of two more victims were released by police on Tuesday. Scotland Yard said financial workers Jamie Gordon, 30, and Philip Stuart Russell, 28, died in the blasts.

After a wave of public scorn and indignation, the U.S. Air Force rescinded an order banning its personnel at two air bases in Britain from visiting London in the wake of the bombings.

London police chief Ian Blair had urged the Americans to reverse their decision as British authorities had been urging people to return to work and normality after the attacks on three underground trains and a bus.

Blair said London, as well as New York, continued to be "major terrorist targets."

"Another attack is likely, there's no question about that. When, who knows?" he told BBC Radio.

Hundreds of extra officers have been drafted in to help in the inquiry. They are examining footage from 2,500 closed circuit television cameras around the capital and assessing information given by around 2,000 callers.

A senior police source told the Times newspaper that two bodies at the scene of the bus bombing had to be examined in close detail because they appeared to be holding the bomb or sitting on top of it.

"One of those might be the bomber," the source was quoted as saying.

Source: REUTERS

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