Britain says arrests foil terror plot

British police arrested nine suspects Wednesday in a possible Iraq-style plot to kidnap and behead a British Muslim soldier and broadcast his death on the Internet.

Authorities raided an Islamic bookshop, a small market and at least 10 other sites in several neighborhoods in the central English city of Birmingham, cordoning off streets and launching a search that was expected to last several days.

The soldier believed to be the target of the purported plot has been identified and is safe, authorities said.

“It was an attempt to kidnap a British Muslim soldier and behead him, film it and post it on some ghastly Internet site,” a British security official said.

The Home Office, in a statement, confirmed the arrests but declined to give further details. “This operation is a reminder of the real and serious nature of the terrorist threat we face,” the statement said.

Intelligence services learned of the plan months ago, placed the suspects under surveillance and took steps to protect the target, the security official said.

“It was very much something the authorities were aware of, and they informed the soldier,” the official said.

The raids created chaos in parts of Birmingham. The blocking of roads produced traffic jams, and onlookers gathered outside search locations in the Asian district of Alum Rock and in several other areas.

Importing terrorism tactics

If details unfold as police think they will, the evidence would suggest that Islamic militants in Britain have shifted from complicated bombing plots to the low-tech option of kidnapping.

Terrorism analysts said the apparent plot, as described by police sources, seemed to be based on the videotaped executions of kidnapping victims in Iraq.

“It seems that this is importing some of the tactics used in Iraq to Britain, which has been predicted by some people just because terrorists are always looking at new and innovative ways to get their message across,” said Matthew Hunt, an analyst with Janusian Security Risk Management in London.

“It’s an intimidatory tactic that is a signal to the rest of the Muslim community that if you actively support your country over your perceived Islamic identity, this won’t be tolerated by certain radical elements of the community,” Hunt said.

Britain has 1.5 million Muslims, but a police source said only about 300 Muslims are in the military. Britain is home to the largest population of Pakistani immigrants in the world and to large numbers of immigrants from India and Africa, many of whom complain of a bias against Muslims.

Extremist sentiment has been growing among younger, second-generation Muslims, with many expressing anger over the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and with Britain’s failure to seek an end to the Israeli bombing in Lebanon last summer.

In a poll published by the Daily Telegraph last week, 40% of young Muslims said they would prefer to live under Islamic Sharia law in Britain. One in eight said they admired groups such as Al Qaeda, which were “prepared to fight the West.”

“I don’t doubt that there really is a risk of terrorism. I don’t doubt that at all. But in the way people are being accused lock, stock and barrel, there is so much skepticism about that in the country,” said Moazzem Begg, a Birmingham resident who, according to the British Broadcasting Corp., was the founder and former owner of the Islamic bookshop that was raided Wednesday.

Begg was arrested on suspicion of terrorism in 2000 and detained by the United States at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba before being released without charges. He said many Muslims in Britain had been subjected to groundless arrests.

“They’ve been interviewing people all day long, and there isn’t anybody who knows any of the people arrested who thinks they could have done this,” Begg said, “or thinks it’s even feasible that eight people could have been planning six months to kidnap one person. For myself, I remain extremely skeptical until I see evidence.”

That could take months, he said.

Questions about evidence

Masher Syed, a volunteer at the Ludlow Road Mosque, near where several of the arrests were made, said police briefed mosque leaders but could provide no details on evidence against the suspects.

“They’re talking about a kidnapping and a beheading. If you’re going to believe their word, you might as well believe a hundred other stories on the Internet. How can they read people’s minds?” Syed said. “Frankly speaking, how would they know what they were planning? Did they find a kitchen knife and a camcorder? Is that enough evidence?”

Syed said extremists were by no means representative of the Muslim population.

“These people represent our religion as much as Hitler represented Christianity, which is not much at all,” he said.

At least two people were arrested in Birmingham in August in a purported plot to bomb transatlantic airliners using liquid explosives.

After the deadly July 2005 transit bombings in London, authorities beefed up the nation’s counter-terrorism forces. Realizing that law enforcement had been heavily centered in London, authorities moved to install security operations in central England near Birmingham and in other urban areas.

Wednesday’s arrests were led by the new counter-terrorism unit, police said.

“Today is a culmination of many months of activity, which has given us the confidence to take the action we have today. Our planning was meticulous,” David Shaw, assistant chief constable of the West Midlands Police, told reporters.

Although a kidnapping would not require the materials or technical know-how of a bombing plot, police said such a plan would nonetheless be difficult to carry out.

Counter-terrorism officials said Muslim extremists often discussed schemes that they were not always capable of executing. They said malevolent “chatter” among militants did not always stand up as evidence in court.

“They certainly had been talking about kidnapping a soldier,” one official said. “And the security services are taking the view that it is likely that a simple kidnapping would not have satisfied what they wanted to achieve. But often young Muslim extremists exaggerate and brag about what they are going to do.”

The official said it was possible that not all of the nine men would be charged.

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kim.murphy@latimes.com

rotella@latimes.com

Murphy reported from London and Rotella from Paris.