Police in huge manhunt for London bomb suspects

LONDON - Police were engaged in one of the biggest manhunts in British history today, scouring London's streets and houses for four suspects who botched their attempts on Thursday to bomb the city's transport network.

Police released photographs of the suspects hours after plain-clothes officers shot and killed a man in front of shocked passengers on an underground train following a chase.

Armed officers later swooped on an apartment block in south London, arresting a man in connection with Thursday's failed attacks while rooftop snipers covered them.

It was one of a series of raids across London by hundreds of police, some armed with assault rifles and machine guns.

As Britons began to fear their country might be in for a sustained series of attacks, London's police chief Ian Blair said his force faced "the greatest operational challenge" in its history.

"This is a very, very fast moving investigation," he told a news conference. "We are facing previously unknown threats and great danger."

London has been subjected to two sets of attacks in two weeks. In both cases, four bombs were taken on to three trains and a bus in four locations across the capital.

The first attacks killed 52 people and injured 700 in the worst peacetime attacks in the city's history. But on Thursday the devices failed to go off properly and no one was killed.

Police refused to say if the man in custody or the man shot dead on the train were among the four suspects pictured in the photographs.

Details of the dramatic chase and shooting dominated British TV bulletins, while newspapers splashed the suspects' pictures beneath the words "The Four Most Wanted", "The Fugitives" and "Human Bombs".

Witnesses said the man slipped as he ran on to a subway train carriage with plain-clothes police close behind him. He was repeatedly shot in the head at point-blank range as he lay on the floor, witnesses said.

"I saw them unload five shots into him - bang, bang, bang, bang, bang," passenger Mark Whitby, 47, said. "Five shots and he's dead. It was no more than five yards (metres) from me."

Police said the man was connected to their investigation into the bombings and had ignored warnings to stop.

But Muslim lobby groups said they were shocked by the killing and urged a full inquiry.

One group, the Islamic Human Rights Commission (IHRC), said it was deeply concerned at the apparent "shoot-to-kill" policy.

"IHRC is afraid that today's killing may only be the first in a series of police killings in the post-7/7 era," IHRC Chairman Massoud Shadjareh said in a statement.

On a day of fast-moving developments, armed police sealed off streets in northwest London and fired tear gas into a house during a raid. No one was arrested. A man was arrested under terrorism laws in the central England city of Birmingham before being freed.

The Abu Hafs al Masri Brigade, an al Qaeda-linked group, has claimed responsibility for Thursday's bombings and those of July 7 and has threatened to target Italy, Denmark and the Netherlands, which also have troops in Iraq.

However, the group's claims of responsibility for previous attacks in Europe have been discredited by security experts.

- REUTERS