Police appeal for bus clues in London bombings

By Michael Holden

LONDON (Reuters) – Police released pictures of a young
British Muslim who carried the fourth of last week’s bombs
aboard a London bus and appealed to the public on Thursday for
information about his final movements.

The suspect, named as Hasib Hussain, was one of four men
captured on security cameras just before 8:30 a.m. last
Thursday at King’s Cross station, about half an hour before
three bombs exploded simultaneously aboard London underground
trains.

The four were carrying rucksacks containing the bombs with
which they blew themselves up in Britain’s first suicide
attacks, blamed by the government on al Qaeda-style Islamist
militants.

A key puzzle in the investigation is why Hussain, unlike
the others, carried his bomb onto a bus, where it exploded
nearly an hour after the three initial blasts.

“The question I’m asking the public is: did you see this
man at King’s Cross?” said Peter Clarke, head of the
Metropolitan Police anti-terrorism branch.

“Was he alone or with others? Do you know the route he took
from the station? Did you see him get onto a number 30 bus? And
if you did, where and when was that?”

Hussain, 18, was one of three suspects previously
identified as young British Muslims of Pakistani origin from
Yorkshire in northern England.

CRICKETER AND TEACHER

The other two were a university-educated cricket enthusiast
and a married man with a baby daughter who worked in primary
schools, helping children with learning difficulties.

Police sources said on Thursday the fourth suspected bomber
was a Jamaican-born Briton.

Pakistan said it would fully assist Britain’s investigation
into the bombings but was awaiting details of trips the
suspects had made to the country. Family members have said one
of them briefly attended a religious school in Pakistan.

“We have an ongoing cooperation with Britain to fight
international terrorism,” said Pakistani Foreign Ministry
spokesman Jalil Abbas Jilani.

Clarke said the investigation was still in its early stages
and that new leads were emerging by the hour.

Police searches were continuing in Yorkshire and at
Aylesbury, 40 miles northwest of London.

Scotland Yard police chief Sir Ian Blair told reporters:
“As far as we are concerned, we are as certain as we can be
that four people were killed and they were the four people
carrying the bombs.”

He drew parallels between the mode of the attacks and last
year’s train bombings that killed 191 people in Madrid.

TRAINING AND FINANCE

“Al Qaeda clearly has the ability to provide training, to
provide briefing and to provide expertise, and that is what
occurred here and what occurred in Madrid,” Blair said.

“We have to find who planned it, where did the finances
come from, where have the explosives gone?”

Earlier, millions across Europe paid silent tribute on
Thursday to the 53 victims of the morning rush-hour attacks one
week ago.

Workers in London poured out of their offices to line the
streets in memory of the dead. Taxis and buses pulled over and
in Trafalgar Square traffic came to a complete standstill as
thousands of people gathered in the hot sun for two minutes’
quiet reflection.

“One City, One World,” read a banner in the square, scene
of joyous celebrations just a day before the bombings when
London won the right to host the 2012 Olympics.

“I just lost one of my best mates — but two minutes ain’t
going to bring him back,” said Declan O’Hora, 22, contemplating
the death of his childhood friend Ciaran Cassidy at King’s
Cross station.

Prime Minister Tony Blair, who on Wednesday said he would
look urgently at new measures to tackle extremism, marked the
silence in the garden of his Downing Street office, while Queen
Elizabeth observed it at Buckingham Palace.

Golfers at the 134th British Open championship stood
quietly on the fairways and greens of the St Andrews course in
Scotland.

Tributes were also paid in Madrid and Bali — both targeted
by bombers from the Islamist al Qaeda network in the past –
and in cities across Europe.