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Smith calls for rethink over terrorism in UK
Britain must reassess its ability to respond to terrorist attacks in the wake of the massacre in Mumbai, says Home Secretary Jacqui Smith.
Security forces in the UK should review the lessons to learn after multiple strikes in the Indian city left 174 dead.
Ms Smith's comments yesterday followed suggestions from a former SAS head and the chairman of the Commons counter-terrorism committee that Britain would be ill-prepared to cope with a similar assault.
Yesterday Indian authorities revised down the death toll from the three-day siege – from 195 to 174. A further 295 people were injured in the attacks on targets in the financial centre.
In India, the fall-out from the massacre saw the country's top security official, home minister Shivraj Patil, hand in his resignation yesterday.
Tension in the sub-continent has escalated in the wake of the atrocity. The sole surviving gunman, now in custody, is said to be of Pakistani origin. It has further been suggested that the other nine militants killed in the attack were his countrymen or trained in Pakistan.
Pakistan categorically denied any links between the militants and its state agencies and said it was prepared to move troops to the Indian border if the diplomatic situation worsened.
The war of words has raised fears of a possible surge of violence in the sub-continent. The nuclear-armed rivals have fought three wars against each other, two over the disputed region of Kashmir.
Speaking on BBC1's Andrew Marr Show yesterday, Ms Smith said the atrocity would put India's relationship with Pakistan on trial.
"I think it does create a test for what has been a warming of relations between India and Pakistan, which is fundamental to us in helping to protect us and them from terrorism," Ms Smith said.
"It's important that that is maintained and is carried forward on a calm basis."
As to the implications of the attacks – in which one Briton died and seven were injured – on the UK's approach to security, the Home Secretary said lessons would be learned.
Ms Smith said: "Of course we do need to look in terms of our own work on terrorism at whether or not and what lessons need to be learned, we need to revise the very important work that we do on protecting our crowded places, our country as a whole from terrorism to bear in mind any lessons that we learn from this and we will do that.
"But what it also of course identifies is what we have said, which is we face a serious and sustained threat from terrorism; that is an international threat; it impacts potentially both on British nationals overseas and also on our interests and our country as well."
She added: "What we do know is that international terrorism is able to develop, to evolve its threat and that therefore we need to evolve our response. We will look very carefully at the implications of this type of attack for our ability to be able to respond."
It followed weekend comments by Patrick Mercer, chairman of the Commons counter-terrorism sub committee.
Mr Mercer said British security forces would be ill-equipped to cope with a Mumbai-style attack, adding that the Olympics in London would be a "magnet" for terrorists.
He told ITV News: "What can happen in Mumbai could just as well happen in Manchester of Birmingham...this style of attack is something we'd find very difficult to cope with."
His views were echoed by that of a former head of the SAS. In an interview with the Sunday Telegraph the former Army officer, who cannot be named for security reasons, said: "The doomsday scenario that we always presented in planning was multiple and mobile incidents in London by suicide armed terrorists because they could very quickly achieve a lot of fatalities before anyone could pinpoint the threats and react effectively.
"This would produce the type of chaos that would defy even the most sophisticated command and control system. You would turn London into a temporary war zone very quickly."
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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