Five British men arrested over a suspected terror plot near a UK air base could have been close to launching a “sophisticated” attack on the site, a former police counter-terror chief has warned.
Counter-terror police today released the men, who are in their 20s and from London, on bail after they were arrested with suspected explosives near RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire on Sunday.
Laurence Taylor, head of National Counter Terrorism Policing, said one line of enquiry is whether individuals may have been working unknowingly on behalf of a foreign state.
The northern pub chain offering £3 pints in London
Amber Taverns is adding a boozer in Bromley, a southeastern suburb of London, to its repertoire of 175 pubs, mainly based in the North West and North East of England.
It comes as pubs get increasingly expensive in the capital, where almost two pubs are closing every day.
Bromley’s new local
The Blackpool-based chain pours pints as cheap as £2.50 – a stark difference for Londoners accustomed to an average £6.50 per pint.
It keeps costs down by buying “unloved” former pubs and sticking to the basics. No hot food means no kitchen and no extra costs.
The Saving Grace will open on the former site of the Barrel and Horn on Bromley High Street.
It follows a spate of new openings in the south of England, including The Erasmus Wolfe in Gosport, Hampshire.
The future of pubs
James Baer, chairman of Amber Taverns, said: “People do still want to very much go to the pub, it’s just a matter of offering good value and a warm welcome. Amber remains a testament to the validity of thriving community pubs.”
He added he thinks there will be more opportunity for the chain to expand in the south of England in the future.
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Angela Scanlon takes over Sara Cox’s Radio 2 drivetime slot
Angela Scanlon will take over the 4pm to 7pm slot on BBC Radio 2 every weekday from November.
Scanlon emerged victorious from a raft of presenters who covered the show over the summer, and will replace DJ Sara Cox.
What you need to know
Since Cox took up the mantle of BBC Radio 2’s breakfast show, the drivetime slot has been up for grabs.
Scanlon, who has previously hosted a Sunday morning programme on the station, has been appointed her successor.
She is also known for presenting The One Show, This Morning, the Get a Grip podcast and for starring in cing in 2023.
‘Every weekday, I’ll be in your ears’
Scanlon said it was “properly exciting” to host the show, adding: “Every weekday, I’ll be in your ears, your cars and your kitchens – on the school run, on the way home, or standing at the hob wondering what on earth to feed a small but hungry mob.”
BBC Radio 2 controller Helen Thomas said she was chosen because she is “incredibly warm and quick witted”.
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Putin’s drone threat to France should be a wake-up call
Russian affairs commentator
Russia has a wide range of choices if it continues stepping up its campaign against Europe.
It could develop its more furtive programme of attacks targeting countries including France, Italy and Britain with actions that are akin to low-grade state terrorism.
The shadow fleet threat
Spanish newspaper described Russian plans to mount attack drones in containers on its shadow fleet, to launch them against France, Spain and Italy.
The plot was disclosed following what’s been widely described as a warning to those countries from the CIA, although both France and Italy denied receiving any specific warning from the US.
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The weakest parts
- This month, Emmanuel Macron called leaders into the country’s crisis centre for a briefing on Russian threats.
- Many previously imagined that lying at the far end of Europe from Russia, France was not in immediate danger.
- But that overlooked Russia’s long-term investment in delivering damage at enormous distances through cyber and proxy attacks.
- That means Putin can strike not just at those parts of Nato that it can drive to, but at the weakest parts of the alliance.
Putin’s grey war
- A Russian “attack” can mean everything from a full-blown invasion of a Nato country, to what is already happening, like sponsoring more and bigger proxy and cyber attacks far behind the front lines.
Denmark’s Defence Intelligence Service has said there are no signs Russia is preparing for an “invasion” of another neighbour, but that the risk of some other form of military attack is “low but growing”.
Sunday morning’s arrests in a small village near RAF Fairford, with the involvement of counter-terrorism police, show the threat of hostile action in the UK is real.
Avanti West Coast trains to be nationalised
The Transport Secretary said the operator has been underperforming “for years” as it becomes the latest service to be brought back into public ownership.
Andy Burnham said the service had failed people “time and time again” with cancellations and overcrowding.
What you need to know
- Avanti West Coast train services will be nationalised from March 2027, when its contract ends.
- Its London hub is Euston station, with services running to Wales, Manchester, Liverpool, Blackpool and Scotland.
- All train services under Department for Transport contracts, including Avanti, are in the process of being transferred to public ownership.
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Reactions from the sector
“For years, we’ve heard stories of Avanti underperforming, with passengers left paying the price. Enough is enough,” Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander said.
Conversely, Andy Mellors, managing director at Avanti West Coast, said: “We’re proud of what we’ve achieved over the last six years – from refurbishing our Pendolino fleet and introducing our new Evero trains to running more services than ever before.”
The results for customers
- Labour claims nationalisation will mean fewer delays and cancellations.
- This is thanks to a £10m investment in power and signalling maintenance, faster and more reliable services, upgraded facilities at Euston, and more stable internet connection on board trains.
Several rail firms around the country are already publicly owned, including Great Anglia and South Western Railway.
Chess prodigy, 11, becomes youngest woman grandmaster
A London schoolgirl has made history while representing England at the 46th Chess Olympiad in Uzbekistan.
Former chancellor, Rachel Reeves, called the young player “a chess superstar”.
Play by play account
Bodhana Sivanandan scored eight points across 11 games, qualifying for the title of woman grandmaster.
The International Chess Federation confirmed this performance made her the youngest person to gain the lifelong title.
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What makes a champion?
Neither of Sivanandan’s parents are good at chess. She taught herself to play during lockdown using YouTube tutorials.
She entered her first tournament at Harrow Chess Club in 2021.
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After she won the British Women’s Championship earlier this year, she said: “I want to become a [full] grandmaster as soon as possible.”
- She now has two of the three “norms” required to become an International Master, the next rank up on the path to becoming a grandmaster.
Women and child die attempting to cross Channel
A 10-year-old child and two women in their 30s have died just off the coast of France, near Calais.
Andy Burnham’s spokesman said the tragedy was a “stark reminder of the dangers posed by criminal gangs”.
What you need to know
- French authorities rescued 102 people from a dinghy which had left Bleriot Plage.
- At least 17 people, including children, have now died attempting to cross the Channel this year.
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The timeline of events
What happened this morning and when:
- The dinghy pushed off from Bleriot Plage, near Calais, on Monday morning.
- French maritime police received a distress call after the boat got into trouble in the water.
- A rescue ship and Navy helicopter were sent to the scene with a medical team.
- The emergency responders were unable to save the child and two women.
- French officials said the deaths were likely due to crushing rather than drowning, due to overcrowding on the boat.
The official response
The Prime Minister’s official spokesperson said: “We’re deeply saddened to hear about the deaths in France today.
“It is a stark reminder of the dangers posed by the criminal gangs who exploit vulnerable people for profit, and we will continue to work relentlessly.”
An investigation has been opened into the incident.
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The i Paper understands they had been under surveillance for some time, but that the arrests were opportunistic rather than the result of direct intelligence.
Meanwhile, security concerns have been raised over how close the masked suspects were able to get to the key air base without police or security services seemingly being aware.
A farmer who raised the alarm after spotting three vans and masked men near the site on Sunday morning told The i Paper she believes she saw around eight or nine suspects – and criticised police for only evacuating locals several hours after she alerted 999.
What kind of attack could have been planned?
Early indications suggest any plan to target the base, which is used by US and British air forces, may have included “a level of sophistication that isn’t common in terrorism”, a former counter-terror chief told The i Paper.
Nick Aldworth, an ex-detective chief superintendent in counter terrorism policing, said the fact that vans featured fake company branding in an apparent bid to avoid raising suspicion and the alleged targeting of a military airfield suggested detailed planning likely to be beyond self-radicalised terrorists.
Aldworth added that the arrangement of the three vans at the time of the arrests suggested preparations were under way to unload the vehicles.
He said: “It appears that the vehicles were parked in a way that suggests to me separation for unloading. You can see the way they’re all positioned with their doors in that sort of little fan shape – and then people away from the vehicles rather than in them and driving.
“The important thing is if those people that were arrested were not with those vehicles at the point of arrest. First priority is going to be to try and tie them into those vehicles because you know the obvious defence is, ‘Not my vehicle boss.’
“A really important investigative plan at the moment will be to actually confirm that the people who’ve been arrested were associated with those vehicles and with whatever might be in those vehicles.”
What planes could have been targeted?
RAF Fairford has been used by US aircraft involved in the air campaign against Iran. Any attack on the base, would be fraught with difficulty.
Its runway is almost two miles long and is reinforced to support heavy bombers such as the B-1 Lancer and B-52 Stratofortress, and also hosts a detachment of U-2 high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft, said Chris Bergs, an air power analyst at think tank the Royal United Services Institute (Rusi).
“Fairford provides reserve capacity, and the ability to quickly fold in significant US striking power when required. This can be used to send a clear signal to adversary nations,” he said.
Ministry of Defence (MoD) police as well as armed US personnel patrol the base, which is “a significant political and deterrent asset”, added Bergs.
It was “very hard” to see how a plan to crash through the gates in a van, and place a vehicle next to a plane before fleeing, could succeed, said Aldworth.
“Maybe there’s the possibility of them having a number of small devices in those vans. And the plan was to take small devices out, try and break through the fence, and then place devices against aeroplanes,” he suggested.
“I don’t think that would be a viable plan because, while these perimeters are big and hard to protect, the assets inside them are more commonly protected. Particularly, the Americans would generally have an armed guard on an aeroplane like that.”
Police ‘took hours to evacuate locals’
People living nearby said security at the site had been ramped up in the days before the incident, with tractors and concrete pillars appearing to have been positioned at entry gates to block access at the start of last week.
The farmer who raised the alarm after spotting three vans and masked men near RAF Fairford in the early hours of Sunday said she believes there were “at least eight or nine” suspects at the scene.
The local resident, who wished to remain anonymous, said she called 999 after there was no response when she rang an emergency number for the Ministry of Defence (MoD) police.
“We think we saw at least eight or nine,” she told The i Paper.
“We had a look in them [the vans]. We didn’t open them, but we realised there was no one sitting in the driver or passenger seats. The vans were empty when we saw them.”
After spotting the men in her headlights, she alerted local residents on a village WhatsApp group warning people to lock their doors.
“I did that at probably 1.45 in the morning, but we didn’t hear anything from the police until they started evacuating people five hours later,” she said.
“So that meant the people whose houses are right next to those vans, if I hadn’t told them about it, they wouldn’t have known.”
How much intelligence did UK authorities have?
The extent to which the UK authorities, including the intelligence services, were already aware of a plot to target RAF Fairford remains unclear.
Defence Secretary Wes Streeting suggested on Monday that the farmer only had a “partial picture” of events, apparently hinting that there had been some prior knowledge of the activity of those under arrest.
The security services and counter-terrorism police routinely monitor dozens of potential terrorist or hostile state threats to the UK at any one time. However, only a small proportion of those threats can be made subject to resource-intensive tactics such as active surveillance or tracking of suspects.
Taylor said CTP was “keeping an open mind” about the investigation, with angles being explored including whether “this may be activity committed by proxies, or individuals either knowingly or unknowingly, working on behalf of a foreign state”
“Often this threat becomes visible to us as criminal activity, often at a small scale and committed by individuals whose primary aim is not terrorism but a quick financial gain,” he added.