London police step up patrols after bombs found

LONDON, June 30 (Reuters) British police bolstered patrols and scoured CCTV footage today after foiling a possible all Qaeda plot to detonate two car bombs packed with fuel and nails in the heart of London.

The Metropolitan Police said they had reviewed plans for public events in the coming 10 days, including a Gay Pride parade in London today, the Wimbledon tennis tournament and a concert for Princess Diana tomorrow, to ensure that there were no public security threats.

''Appropriate policing will be in place for all events,'' a police spokeswoman said. ''Safety and security is our number one priority.'' While there was a visible increase in police patrols around key installations, including the Houses of Parliament, Londoners and tourists appeared to be unperturbed, going about their business as usual despite widespread rain.

''You could be safe anywhere or you could be safe nowhere. It hasn't put me off travelling here,'' said Ivonne Geller, 49, a tourist from Mexico strolling outside Tiger Tiger, the night club outside which one of the car bombs was left.

''I just feel angry about the methods of these people who try to harm innocent people.'' An intense counter-terrorism investigation was launched after the discovery in the early hours of yesterday of a metallic green Mercedes packed with up to 60 litres of fuel, several gas canisters and a large quantity of nails.

The vehicle was parked outside the night club, in the teeming theatreland district of London, and aroused suspicion only after ambulance workers, treating someone else, thought they noticed smoke inside the vehicle.

FUME-FILLED CAR On inspection, a mobile phone, which security experts believe may have been a triggering device, was found inside the abandoned, fume-filled car.

A second Mercedes packed with gas and nails was later found to have been parked just a few hundred yards from the first, before it was towed away by traffic wardens in the early hours of yesterday for violating parking restrictions.

Police said the two vehicles were clearly linked. Both bombs were quickly defused but had they gone off, they would have caused significant casualties, police said.

Intelligence sources believe there is a rising probability that the plot was hatched by an al Qaeda-style group.

''The feeling it is Islamist, rather than the other possibilities, is very quietly growing stronger,'' a source said.

The area of London where the car bombs were left, known as Haymarket, is one of the busiest in the capital and one of the most intensely monitored by CCTV surveillance.

Police said they were studying hundreds of hours of footage in the hunt for possible suspects. The US television channel ABC reported that a ''crystal clear'' image of a suspect had been found, but British police would not confirm that.

Security sources said an important angle of investigation was an Islamist Web site called al-Hesbah which on Thursday carried a posting by a regular contributor saying that London was going to be bombed, according to CBS television.

''It will obviously be a line of enquiry,'' the source said.

The Scotsman newspaper reported that an Iraqi man who absconded from police monitoring 11 days ago was also being sought. Scotland Yard said it did not discuss possible suspects.

REUTERS SBC RK1830