Explosions were heard on Friday in west London, a news report said, after police confirmed they had launched an armed operation linked to investigations into bombings on the capital last week.
Six explosions were heard in the Ladbroke Grove area, some of which local residents were told by police had been caused by stun grenades, Sky News television said.
“We are in the early stages of an armed operation in the W10 area of west London,” a spokesperson for London’s metropolitan police said in a brief statement.
“It’s in connection with the attempted bombings on July 21 and cordons are in place as a precaution.”
Sky News cited police sources as saying the raid was aimed at capturing “one or more” of the four July 21 bombers, three of whom remain at large, with one arrest reported.
Local residents said they witnessed police officers carrying machine guns and wearing gas masks, and heard a loud explosion followed by smaller blasts.
Sky News said police were trying to convince a man inside a block of flats to remove his clothes and exit the building.
The area targeted by police is close to Westbourne Park underground station, where a would-be suicide bomber who tried to blow himself up on a train at nearby Shepherd’s Bush station on July 21 got on to a train.
Four suspected attackers fled subway trains and a bus after their bombs, carried in rucksacks, seemingly failed to go off properly.
The attack was a virtual carbon copy of events two weeks earlier, when 56 people, including four British Muslim suicide bombers, died when blasts were set off on three subway trains and a bus. — AFP