The Channel Tunnel connecting the United Kingdom and France has been targeted by a group of Islamic militant terrorists aiming to cause maximum carnage during the holiday season, according to French and American secret services.
The plan, of which the French DGSE foreign intelligence service became aware earlier this year, is revealed in a secret report to the French government on threat levels. The report, dated December 19, indicates that the tip-off came from the American CIA.
British and French intelligence agencies have run a series of checks of the security system protecting the 50,5km tunnel but the threat level, the DGSE warns, remains high. British security services remain on high alert throughout the holiday period.
According to the French sources, the plan was put together in Pakistan and is being directed from there. The plotters are believed to be Western Europeans, possibly Britons of Pakistani descent. The DGSE say that levels of ”chatter”, the constant communication that takes place between militants, has not been so high since 2001. Last week Sir Ian Blair, the head of the London metropolitan police, described ”the threat of another terrorist attempt” as ”ever present”, adding that ”Christmas is a period when that might happen”.
”It is a far graver threat in terms of civilians than either the Cold War or World War II,” he said. ”It’s a much graver threat than that posed by Irish Republican terrorism.”
American security sources told the Observer that the threat was ”sky high”.
The news of the threat to the Channel Tunnel came as Eurostar trains transport recorded numbers of passengers heading home for Christmas and as fog continued to affect flights to and from the continent.
More than eight million passengers travelled on Eurostar trains last year. Staff on the line went on strike earlier this year in protest at what they said were lax security arrangements.
”A successful attack on such an installation would be almost as spectacular as September 11,” said one terrorist expert. ”Al-Qaeda and those they inspire are trying everything from low-level strikes to major attacks on critical infrastructure.”
The DGSE report also mentions an al-Qaeda project for a ”wave of attacks in an unidentified European country planned and run from Syria and Iraq”. The period of highest risk is said to be from September 2006 to April 2007.
The detail in which the attacks have been planned in Pakistan will worry British counter-terrorist services. The United Kingdom is in a particularly vulnerable position as a result of its close alliance with the United States, its physical accessibility compared with the US, and its large Muslim minority, many of whom have links with Pakistan.
Osama bin Laden and other key senior al-Qaeda leaders are thought to be based in the tribal territories along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. There is believed to be a steady stream of British militants making their way to the newly reconstituted al-Qaeda bases in the region.
More than 400 000 British citizens travel to Pakistan every year. Though the vast majority are visiting family or friends, some have exploited the ease of travel for darker reasons: at least two of the 7/7 bombers spent time in the south-west Asian state.
Last week news reports in the US detailed a squad of a dozen English-speaking militants — nine of whom are said to be British who, having sought out the al-Qaeda bases, have received high-level training in terrorist tactics. The group is known as the English Brothers because of its members’ shared language. Apart from the nine Britons, the squad is made up of an Australian and two Norwegians. It was reported that Bin Laden and other militant leaders hope they will lead a new wave of terror attacks on the continent.
Eliza Manningham-Buller, director general of MI5, recently disclosed that UK intelligence services are monitoring more than 200 networks and 1 600 individuals in Britain. She said that her investigators had identified nearly 30 plots ”that often have links back to al-Qaeda in Pakistan, and through those links al-Qaeda gives guidance and training to its largely British foot soldiers here”. — Guardian Unlimited Â