Police Inquiries Into Islamic Threat Must Improve, Says Clarke (UK)

The Telegraph (UK) ^ | 2-10-2006 | Duncan Clarke

[blam]

Police inquiries into Islamic threat must improve, says Clarke

By Duncan Gardham
(Filed: 10/02/2006)

Charles Clarke accepted yesterday that there had been a "lack of confidence" in the case against the radical cleric Abu Hamza and pledged to improve the way the police conducted investigations.

The Home Secretary's remarks followed a claim by his predecessor, David Blunkett, that he had been accused by police and security services of exaggerating the threat posed by Hamza.

The former imam of Finsbury Park Mosque in north London was jailed for seven years this week for incitement to murder, stirring up racial hatred and possessing a document useful to terrorists.

When officers raided the mosque in 2003 they found blank-firing guns, hunting knives, tear-gas and hundreds of forged and stolen documents. But Hamza was left to continue preaching in the street for another year until he was held on a US warrant.

Mr Clarke said: "I am delighted we have got the conviction, but the lesson I draw is that firstly we have to continue to strengthen the law as we have been, secondly, that we have to improve our investigative capacity so the evidence is able to be put in court in the most effective way, and thirdly, we need a determination - political, yes, but also throughout the Crown Prosecution Service and police - to secure the convictions."

Mr Blunkett had been far blunter in The Sun. "So much for those in the police, security services and Crown Prosecution Service who told me when I was Home Secretary that I was exaggerating the threat and that the closure of the Finsbury Park Mosque would be a 'massive over-reaction'," he wrote.

"There was a deep reluctance to act on the information coming out of Abu Hamza's own mouth and some people did not want to believe how serious it all was."

Hamza had already been linked to terrorists including Zacarias Moussaoui, the 20th September 11 hijacker. Special Branch officers began to realise that Finsbury Park had begun to be the "first port of call" for terrorists in this country but admit they were nervous of Muslim reaction if they raided the mosque.

Instead of concentrating on what Hamza said, they twice looked at the evidence of his links with a kidnap plot in the Yemen, in 1999 and 2003.

Phone-tap evidence showed Hamza had made calls to the kidnappers but the evidence was not admissible in British courts. Three Britons - Ruth Williamson, Margaret Whitehouse and Peter Rowe - were among four tourists killed in a rescue attempt.

At the time, French intelligence officials, frustrated at the unwillingness of police in this country to stop Hamza and his associates, began calling the capital "Londonistan".

In the meantime, Hamza spread his message in London, Luton and Blackburn and his audience included Muslims who had travelled from Birmingham, Bristol and abroad.

[Brilliant]

The question is how long London can go without another Islamic attack. They are living on borrowed time.

[Pukin Dog]

They just need to go "Jack Bauer" on their asses until they talk.