Posted on 11/02/2001 9:47:06 PM PST by janus
BBC did not tell police about bin Laden caller in London
By Sean O'Neill
(Filed: 03/11/2001)
THE BBC did not inform police of a telephone call it received from a London representative of Osama bin Laden's al-Qa'eda terrorist network.
The corporation's Arabic Service took the call on Thursday morning minutes before it was faxed a copy of bin Laden's most recent statement urging Pakistani Muslims to overthrow President Musharraf.
The caller, speaking in Arabic with a marked Pakistani or Afghani accent, said he represented bin Laden and wanted to send a statement to the BBC World Service.
Although he said he was calling from outside Britain, a digital display on the telephone in the office where the call was taken revealed that it came from a London number.
Details of the contact - which suggest that an al-Qa'eda cell may be active in London - were not reported to the anti-terrorist branch, which is hunting bin Laden associates in Britain. BBC insiders said that they feared the number of the anonymous caller, who reporters tried without success to ring back, had been lost.
Scotland Yard is unhappy that it was not notified about the call. Anti-terrorist squad officers are now examining the matter but it is feared that their chances of tracing the caller have been lost because of the delay.
A police source said: "Distributing statements on behalf of terrorists is an offence. We would like to have been informed." Al-Qa'eda has used London as a base for disseminating its propaganda before.
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Look under the bed, and in Luton, first.
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