Sunday Times: July 7th questions that still haunt victims
The case for a public enquiry is overwhelming, says Rachel North ( that's me, that is) in the second page of today's Sunday Times News Review.
Meanwhile we can see why Blair isn't very keen to wash dirty linen in public ( today's Sunday Times front page)
I said I was not shutting up about this, and your support is very welcome - http://www.petitiononline.com/July7th/petition.html ( sign the petition)
http://www.writetothem.com/ ( write to your M.P)
thank you.
On the page opposite my piece, 'Beware of the Thought Police', an article about freedom of speech and the frightening erosion of it under the Government. If you think that anti-terrorism powers are being used misused, please support us as we sing carols in Parliament Square on Wednesday night, with Maya Evans who was arrested for reading out the names of the dead soldiers of the latest Iraq war outside Downing Street. A demonstration of joy, hope and festive spirit. That we can all be arrested for.
As Bush wriggles to defend the secret spying on US citizens to an angry Congress, as M15 are accused of colluding with the flying out of 'terror suspects' to murky torture jails it feels like it is time to speak up about what is being done and not done in our name, to ask questions and to demand answers. If not now, when?
Meanwhile we can see why Blair isn't very keen to wash dirty linen in public ( today's Sunday Times front page)
'SPYMASTERS warned Tony Blair before the July 7 suicide bombings that
Al-Qaeda was planning a “high priority” attack specifically aimed at the London
Tube. A leaked four-page report by the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC), which oversees all spying, is the first definitive evidence that the intelligence services expected terrorists to strike at the Underground. The disclosure will fuel critics’ suspicions that Blair decided to rule out a public inquiry into the bombings last week because it could expose intelligence failings at the highest level'
I said I was not shutting up about this, and your support is very welcome - http://www.petitiononline.com/July7th/petition.html ( sign the petition)
http://www.writetothem.com/ ( write to your M.P)
thank you.
On the page opposite my piece, 'Beware of the Thought Police', an article about freedom of speech and the frightening erosion of it under the Government. If you think that anti-terrorism powers are being used misused, please support us as we sing carols in Parliament Square on Wednesday night, with Maya Evans who was arrested for reading out the names of the dead soldiers of the latest Iraq war outside Downing Street. A demonstration of joy, hope and festive spirit. That we can all be arrested for.
As Bush wriggles to defend the secret spying on US citizens to an angry Congress, as M15 are accused of colluding with the flying out of 'terror suspects' to murky torture jails it feels like it is time to speak up about what is being done and not done in our name, to ask questions and to demand answers. If not now, when?
posted by Rachel at 10:25 am
Rachel,
Thanks for the links: a wee bit more comment here.
DK
Plus have you heard this from today's Independent, which I just added to my blog post.
"Two of the four suicide bombers who killed 52 people in the July 7 attacks were scrutinised by MI5 last year but were not considered to be a threat.....
Shahzad Tanweer, 22, who detonated a rucksack bomb on the Tube train at Aldgate, is believed to have been indirectly linked to an alleged plot to build a bomb in 2004. It has already been established that the suspected mastermind, Mohammad Sidique Khan, 30, had been known to security services.
The disclosure that a second of the four bombers had come to the attention of MI5 is likely to increase pressure for a public inquiry into the London attacks and any failures in intelligence. Charles Clarke, the Home Secretary, is resisting setting up a wide-ranging independent inquiry, instead opting for a more limited "narrative" led by a civil servant. The Independent has also established that there are so many new terrorist suspects coming to the attention of the security agencies and Scotland Yard's anti-terrorist branch that there are not enough officers to investigate them all."