TOKYO - Police investigating a disturbance outside Japan's Defense Agency on Tuesday found a pair of homemade rocket launchers that may have used been in a symbolic attack by leftist radicals. No injuries or damage were reported.
The area around the agency in downtown Tokyo was cordoned off and police and firefighters were called in after authorities received reports of two loud bangs late Tuesday night.
Investigators found a pair of pipes fashioned into crude projectile launchers but were still looking for what they might have fired, a spokesman for the Tokyo Metropolitan Police said on condition of anonymity.
Leftist radicals in Japan occasionally make symbolic attacks with such weapons on targets related to the military or Japan's royal family.
Police suspect the homemade weapons may have been set off in a protest of a controversial decision by the Japanese government to send troops to help rebuild Iraq (news - web sites), the spokesman said.
18feb04
LONDON: Terrorists may be "in the final stages" of preparing more attacks in Saudi Arabia, the British Government warned yesterday as it advised UK citizens not to travel to the country.
The unusually strong statement followed the cancellation of a British Airways flight from London to the Saudi capital of Riyadh, which was grounded because of unspecified security fears.
"Following terrorist attacks in Riyadh in May and November 2003, we believe that terrorists remain determined to carry out further attacks in Saudi Arabia and that these may be in the final stages of preparation," the Foreign Office said on its website.
"We advise British nationals against all but essential travel to Saudi Arabia," it said in updated travel advice.
"The threat includes, but is not limited to, residential compounds," it added. "British Airways cancelled its 16 February BA 263 flight to Riyadh for security reasons."
The Foreign Office has issued a string of warnings to its citizens about Saudi Arabia in the wake of a series of attacks blamed on Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network.
On November 9, terrorists attacked the Muhayya residential compound in Riyadh, killing 18 people and injuring more than 80.
That attack followed co-ordinated bombings at residential compounds in Riyadh on May 12, which killed more than 30 people, including two British nationals.
On Friday, the Saudi interior ministry warned residents of the capital that a car carrying explosives and registered to a wanted suspect could be used in an attack.
The ministry urged residents to be on the alert, "especially since this misled group (of terror suspects) tends to hide these dangerous components in residential areas".
British Airways has been hit by a series of terrorism alerts this year, with flight 263 to Riyadh cancelled twice and one service from London to Washington grounded five times, with the latest scare at the weekend.
BA recently accepted in principal that it would allow armed air marshalls on its planes to guard against possible hijackings.
Earlier yesterday, representatives from the five leading European Union nations met in Germany to discuss the issue of the sky marshalls.
Interior ministers from Germany, France, Britain and Spain, along with Italian officials, gathered in Garmisch-Partenkirchen for the meeting.