UK police defend shoot-to-kill after fatal mistake

By Katherine Baldwin

LONDON (Reuters) – British police on Sunday defended a
policy of shooting to kill suspected suicide bombers after
shooting dead a Brazilian electrician by mistake in the hunt
for London’s bombers.

Brazil has demanded an explanation from Britain after
police searching for four men suspected of trying to bomb
London’s transport system last Thursday shot Brazilian Jean
Charles de Menezes, 27, at an underground railway station in
south London.

“I think we are quite comfortable that the policy is right,
but of course these are fantastically difficult times,”
Metropolitan Police Commissioner Ian Blair told Sky Television.

Asked if the instructions were to shoot to kill if police
believed a suspect was a suicide bomber, he said: “Correct.
They have to be that.”

“It’s still happening out there, there are still officers
having to make those calls as we speak … Somebody else could
be shot,” Blair added.

Last Thursday’s failed bomb attacks, which killed no one
but caused mass panic, came exactly 2 weeks after suicide
bombers killed 52 people on London’s underground rail network
and a bus.

Police had earned widespread praise for their handling of
the inquiry, but the killing of an innocent man has raised
concern about the trade-off between human rights and security.

Muslim leaders fear members of their community will be
targeted after police identified the four men who blew
themselves up on July 7 as British Muslims.

“To give license to people to shoot to kill just like that,
on the basis of suspicion, is very frightening,” said Azzam
Tamimi of the Muslim Association of Britain.

Former London police chief John Stevens wrote in the News
of the World newspaper that he had sent teams to Israel and
other countries hit by suicide bombings to train in combating
them.

FAMILY LEFT DISTRAUGHT

Blair said Menezes had emerged from a block of flats in
south London that had been under surveillance in connection
with Thursday’s attacks, and refused police orders to halt. He
apologized to the victim’s relatives.

“They had to kill someone to show the whole population they
are working and make the country safe,” Alex Pereira, Menezes’
cousin, told BBC Television.

“I ask the people to ask the Metropolitan Police and (Prime
Minister) Tony Blair and everybody responsible for that: ‘What
kind of job are they doing?”‘

The police chief Blair noted that the two sets of London
bombings had followed a similar pattern, but said no definite
link had been established.

British media, citing security sources, said two of the
July 7 bombers had attended a white water rafting trip at the
same center in Wales as some of the suspected July 21 bombers.

This was based on evidence discovered in rucksacks left
behind by the failed bombers. Detectives believe the trip could
have been used as a bonding exercise, the sources said.

Ian Blair said a number of suspects arrested since Thursday
would remain in custody but the search continued for four men.

“We are still anxious for any sighting of the four
individuals or any knowledge of them or where they have been,”
Blair said, adding police had no reason to believe they had
left the country.

The Abu Hafs al-Masri Brigade, a group that claims links to
al Qaeda, has said it carried out Thursday’s bombing attempts
and the July 7 attacks. However, its claims of responsibility
for previous attacks in Europe have been discredited by
security experts.

(additional reporting by Alison Tudor and Paul Majendie)