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American Morning

London Terror Alert

Aired June 29, 2007 - 06:59   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

PETER CLARKE, DEP. ASST. COMM., SCOTLAND YARD: At the moment, we're entirely open to every line of investigation. The reports which you've mentioned about the car being driven erratically and then crashing into bins, if those people are available who saw that, we would like them to come forward and give us that information.
KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: And welcome to AMERICAN MORNING. It's 7:00 Eastern Time, which makes it noon in London. And this is where this press conference is coming from.

Scotland Yard updating us on the situation that has been breaking all morning long, which is a car bomb, a potentially deadly car bomb, found in a very popular area of London, a nightclub -- or outside of a nightclub in the Haymarket district. A Mercedes parked outside. And we are now hearing confirmation that inside of this Mercedes were significant quantities of gas, of petrol, cylinders, a large number nails.

And Scotland Yard is telling us they were able to disable this device that had the potential to cause a lot of harm and injury. They are crediting the people, the explosives officers who manually disabled the device, so that there will be an opportunity to gather evidence and other evidence from the vehicle.

All we're learning is that there was reports of smoke coming from the inside of the vehicle. They are not going to speculate right now on who may have been involved or what the intention was. They do say they are going to be looking at closed circuit television evidence to find out more details.

Also saying the threat from terrorism is here, it's real, it's enduring, but that life must go on.

Let's listen to some more.

(JOINED IN PROGRESS)

CLARKE: Well, again, I don't want to speculate as to whether this was an actual attack at the time or whether it was something that was left there. The investigation will tell us that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And there's lots of questions here.

Question from?

QUESTION: Alan Cowell (ph) from "The New York Times" .

Is this linked in your mind to the anniversary of July the 7th or the arrival of the new government?

CLARKE: That would be entirely speculative. I can't possibly answer that. I don't know.

Now, we're investigating from the facts. We are doing what we always do, which is starting at the scene of the crime and conducting a meticulous investigation, and going where the evidence takes us.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Next question right here.

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)

CLARKE: Well, as I've mentioned already, in one previous case we heard talk about nightclubs potentially becoming targets. In the Barak (ph) case, which sometimes we refer to as Operation Rhyme, we of course saw reference to vehicles being filled with gas or fuel in order to create an explosion. So, obviously, we're aware of that, but at this stage, it's far too soon to draw any conclusions.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Next question here.

QUESTION: Duncan John (ph) from "The Telegraph".

Do you think that this was a solo operations, or were there other operations involved? And can you say at this stage whether you believe it's Islamic terrorism?

CLARKE: Again, as I've said, I'm keeping an entirely open mind about that. I have, of course, referred to some facets, some features of what's happened which resonate with previous plots. But I wouldn't, at this stage, like to speculate. I think that would probably be unhelpful. I want to investigate.

QUESTION: Is there any -- is this a solo operation? Or are there any other ones that you're looking at?

CLARKE: We're obviously alert to the possibility. We don't rule anything out. We don't rule anything in. It would be speculation entirely to say that there are or are not other operations.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Question there, please?

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE).

CLARKE: Well, obviously, when this sort of thing occurs, we always automatically search the area to make sure that there are no other devices which could cause a threat to the public or to the emergency services who are responding. That's standard practice.

QUESTION: And it was the immediate area?

CLARKE: Yes, indeed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Question there?

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE) CLARKE: Yes. I won't at this stage go into great detail about that, because, of course, they have to be debriefed and they have to give us their full reports. But on the early indications, having spoken to them, I can tell you they always operate in pairs, of course, with considerable support. But I won't go into the details of how long they took or how they went about their work.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'll take two or three more questions.

OK. Question there, please.

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)

CLARKE: There is no intelligence whatsoever that we were going to be attacked in this way.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stewart (ph).

QUESTION: (INAUDIBLE) are there any links between this and any devices (INAUDIBLE) the last day or even this morning?

CLARKE: It's far too early to say.

QUESTION: There is a report that a device has been found in (INAUDIBLE). Are you aware of that?

CLARKE: Yes, but I haven't had a chance yet to conduct any meetings or comparison or analysis.

QUESTION: Are you in touch with (INAUDIBLE)?

CLARKE: We are constantly in touch with our international partners.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Question there.

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)

CLARKE: Well, this will all form part of the investigation, of course. I can't give a precise figure at the moment.

QUESTION: Can you say in the hundreds or thousands?

CLARKE: I think weed we'd certainly be into the hundreds.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The last question -- Justin (ph).

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)

CLARKE: Three questions, Justin (ph).

Are we going to raise the threat level? Of course, that is kept under constant review by those whose responsibility it is to set the threat level. In terms of witnesses and arrests, obviously that's part of the continuing investigation. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK, Ladies and Gentlemen. I'm going to thank you very much. And obviously, we will keep you updated as things develop.

Thank you very much.

JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR: All right. So there's a press conference from the deputy assistant commissioner of Scotland Yard, Peter Clarke, who put together the pieces, the timeline for us, saying that about 1:00 in the morning outside of the Tiger Tiger nightclub, an ambulance crew arrived on scene. They had been called to the Tiger Tiger nightclub to treat someone who was potentially ill.

While they were there, they noticed this silver Mercedes that was parked outside and saw smoke inside the passenger compartment. They then called the police.

The bomb squad came down, took a look at what was going on inside. They said that they saw several gas canisters. Not saying though what was inside the gas, whether it was propane, some other flammable gas, or whether it was potentially some toxic gas. But we do believe from talking with security expert Will Geddes there was some sort of flammable gas.

They also saw canisters, containers of fuel, gasoline, perhaps diesel fuel, that were inside the car as well. Though for the explosive purposes, as I mentioned, it would have been gasoline.

They said there were significant quanties of both. They also found a quantity of nails in the car as well, which construction of a bomb would lead you to believe that they would be used as shrapnel to cause the most amount of injury possible.

When the bomb squad arrived on the scene, they took a look at the situation, they assessed it. It was best for them to immediately go in and diffuse this bomb, so they actually went inside the car and manually, according to Peter Clarke, disarmed this device. He said if it were detonated, it would have cause significant injury and loss of life.

And at this point as to who might be responsible, Clarke said it's too early to tell, though you can bet that the investigation is going on and at an extreme pace right now as they try to trace back the origin of this vehicle, the original of the bomb. They look back through closed circuit television, and, of course, these congested area cameras that are all over the place.

These are how they identify vehicles to charge them from being inside that congested area. So there should be plenty of videotape of this to try to figure out what route this car took, where it came from, who might be responsible, and tracing back the driver.

There was a fellow on scene who was interviewed just a little while ago named Winston Beck (ph). His car was parked very close to this one. Here is what he had to say about everything.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: By the time we came to the car, the place was semi-cordoned off, and they put a blue tent over. I didn't see exactly what.

At that time, we were so innocent, we didn't know what was -- it just shows how vigilant you've got to be, you know? That any time, anything can happen at any time, you know? And, I mean that is the scary part, because look how close I am. If that device had to go off while I'm there, definitely, I would be damaged.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERTS: Definitely more than damaged, according to the deputy assistant commissioner, who said, again, if detonated, this device could have caused significant injury and loss of life.

CHETRY: So once again, we're going to bring in our chief international correspondent, Christiane Amanpour, who is joining us here in New York today.

A little bit of a change in what we were reporting earlier, which originally we heard that it was 2:00 a.m. that a bouncer or a doorman noticed this car driving into an area of garbage cans. That since has been changed.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: That's why these press conferences are so vital, because you get these little snippets of actual information. So now they're putting it back one hour.

At 1:00 a.m., they're saying, as John had reported, that the London ambulance service was called. And it was actually the ambulance service, apparently, that seemed to tip off the explosives people, because as they were called there to treat what we're told was a person taken ill at the nightclub, then they came and they saw this car and they saw smoke, and that's when they called the explosives people, and that's when the explosives people, who are really heroes -- again, I've seen them operate in many occasions, not just urban, but in the field as well -- they came and manually disabled whatever was there and potentially what was to be set off.

So I think that's really interesting new information. Other than that, he's not telling us, Peter Clarke, how many suspects they have, not telling us what is inside the cylinders. Only saying that all of this evidence is now undergoing, you know, very intense forensic investigation.

CHETRY: The other thing that he did was issued another call to the public, that it's so vital, that we need your help if you know anything, repeating a number several times for people to call if they thought they saw anything. And we're going to show right now a map, because you are familiar with this Haymarket area.

And there's a look right there of where it was and where the car was found in relation to Piccadilly Circus. AMANPOUR: That's absolutely right. Well, you've got the River Thames there and all the big buildings of state and government. For instance, parliament, Big Ben, which just two days ago, parliament was the scene of this transfer of power from Tony Blair to Gordon Brown.

You have the Piccadilly Circus, which is the famous sort of center right there of what is essentially the theater district. And it is a very, very popular and always filled tourist area. That's where not just Londoners, not just people from all over England, but people who come from abroad gravitate to there. And it's always full of people walking, driving.

There is Leicester Square there, the big, big cinemas, many, many nightclubs. It's the Soho area as well, where the Chinese restaurants and the Chinese section of town.

And as you can see, it's not that far from Buckingham Palace. It really is the very, very heart, the real heart of tourist London. And it's not far from Trafalgar Square and the -- White Hall, or the government buildings. You know, in that sort of square mile area around there, there is an enormous amount of interesting and opportune targets if you want to do something and make not only damage and cause loss of life, but make a big show of where you went and how you were able to get through this incredibly popular place.

CHETRY: And, in fact, we heard Scotland Yard's Peter Clarke say that this was going to be turned over, and the lead investigators on this would be the Metropolitan Police. And we heard Sir Ian Blair, the commissioner, say earlier this year he felt that vehicle-born weaponry is the greatest danger that we can face in London.

AMANPOUR: Well, I tell you, this is obviously something that's extremely worrying, because you can see a sort of evolution of targets and tactics that potential terrorists are using. Whether it's the roadside bombs in Iraq that have now transferred to first-time use in Afghanistan, to devastating effect, or whether it's coming here to Europe as well.

First, you had the trains in Madrid, you had the trains in London. And now perhaps you're having potentially roadside bombs or suicide bombs in the middle of busy cities in Europe. And I think one thing that Peter Clarke said that was really interesting, and potentially linked it to the sort of al Qaeda kind of terrorism, he said, "I can't tell you exactly why it was there, but we do know that nightclubs have been mentioned by terrorists as potential targets."

CHETRY: Start with the Bali bombings as well.

ROBERTS: You know, very reminiscent of the Bali bombing back there in October of 2002, but that was a coordinated attack where a smaller bomb was set off at the back of the club, drove people out to the front, when the larger one was ignited. And that's a question that investigators certainly are going to be looking at today, is was this part of a larger coordinated attack that went wrong, didn't come off as planned? Was there somebody inside who was going to cause a disruption, cause people to go out in the streets? And we got this interesting little tidbit of information from the deputy assistant commissioner, Peter Clarke, who said there was smoke in the car, and that's what -- that's what got the attention of the ambulance drivers. Now, was the smoke a fuse that had been lit? Was this smoke potentially the device misfired? Was that just the detonator that went off and did not ignite the main charge? What caused the smoke?

AMANPOUR: Again, we really have to wait for the answers to that, but it is always the "what ifs". And he said quite clearly that had it gone off, it would have caused significant -- not just damage, but loss of life. This would have been a very bloody affair had it gone off, according to Peter Clarke. I think he said perhaps in the hundreds...

CHETRY: I think he said in the hundreds as well.

AMANPOUR: ... of people. And of course, you know, it stands to reason, this was a crowded place at a crowded time, in a crowded area of London, where most people go for pleasure, certainly at that time of night.

CHETRY: And that was another question that a lot of the reporters were trying to get -- do you believe that it was Tiger Tiger nightclub that was the target? And Peter Clarke was saying, all we can say is that's where the car was found, that's where the car was parked. As to whether or not that specific nightclub was the target, it's still something that they're not ready to confirm.

AMANPOUR: But that's when he added his terrorists have said nightclubs are legitimate targets. So...

ROBERTS: As you mentioned, this taking place on the first full day of operation for the new Brown government. He just named his cabinet this morning, and, of course, they immediately convened an emergency meeting of the COBRA committee, which involves government, law enforcement agencies as well.

And Gordon Brown went down to the scene. He was talking with people on the scene, and he had this to say immediately after touring the area.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GORDON BROWN, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: The home secretary will be chairing a proper (ph) meeting, after which she will report to a meeting of the cabinet this morning. The first duty of a government is security of the people, and as the police and security services have said on so many occasions, we face a serious and continued security threat to our country.

We should allow the police to investigate this incident and then report to us, but this incident does recall the need for us to be vigilant at all times and the public to be alert at any potential incidents. And I will stress to the cabinet that the vigilance must be maintained over these next few days. (END VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERTS: Vigilance, indeed. And, in fact, it was an ambulance attendant or an emergency medical technician who first spotted the suspicious vehicle with the smoke inside.

Our Robin Oakley is outside of Number 10 Downing Street right now for us.

Robin, is that COBRA meeting still ongoing? Do we know anything more -- any more response from the new British government?

ROBIN OAKLEY, CNN EUROPEAN POLITICAL EDITOR: No. The COBRA meeting with the security chiefs may well be going on, but with officials only. Jacqui Smith, the new home secretary, fresh in office from Gordon Brown's appointment of his new team yesterday, chaired COBRA to begin with, but now there is a full cabinet meeting going on.

Of course, this has been an enormous reminder to Gordon Brown and his new team of the harsh realities of modern politics. The very first day, full day that Gordon Brown had in office, three more British soldiers were killed in Iraq. Now the first full day in which his cabinet has been operative with the new home secretary, we've had this major security incident. And it will certainly concentrate their minds about the problems which lie ahead, and it will tend to brush out of the picture the big initiative that Gordon Brown was hoping to launch today to rebuild trust in the whole process of government in Britain.

He's due to make a big statement about that in the British parliament on Monday. He was hoping to get ministers focused on that today. But, of course, they will largely have pushed their concerns on to the question of the security threat. And with Gordon Brown there saying that the public have got to be vigilant over some days ahead, clearly there is the fear that this was not a single incident but could be linked to other possible terrorist security attempts -- John.

ROBERTS: Hey, Robin, we're fortunate to have with us this morning your colleague, Christiane Amanpour, who was in the United States on an unrelated issue. We woke her up. She has raced into the studios. She wants to say hello.

AMANPOUR: Robin, you and I were reporting on Gordon Brown assuming the mantle of power just two days ago. You were standing out there when he came out and he gave a speech. And he said, "I will be strong in purpose, steadfast in will and resolute in action."

And many viewers said, "What war are we in? What is he talking about? We're not being attacked."

They really thought that he was giving sort of a Marshall -- Marshall speech there. And here, in his second day, he's faced with this.

OAKLEY: Absolutely, Christiane. And of course he did talk during his campaign for the Labour leadership, which carried with it in this instance the job of prime minister, he did talk about the need to step up Britain's anti-terrorist measures.

He is looking towards new legislation in parliament in the autumn which could extend the amount of time that terrorist suspects are held for questioning by the police. Currently, it's 28 days. There wasn't an attempt in Tony Blair's time to extend that to 90 days.

Nobody knows quite how far Gordon Brown will try and push it. But this latest incident may affect people's minds when they come to take that position, because originally parliament wouldn't let Tony Blair have his way on that.

There's also a big debate which Gordon Brown has been engaged with the other parties behind the scenes about whether telephone intercept evidence should be allowed in court. It isn't at the moment in the prosecution of terrorist defenses after security incidents of this kind. The security services themselves are a little bit reluctant about that because they fear it might give away their surveillance methods -- Christiane and John.

ROBERTS: You know, Robin, this is a very, very big weekend in London, because at Wembley Stadium there is this big concert for Diana this weekend.

What has this incident prompted in terms of security concerns for that huge event?

OAKLEY: Well, there will be massive security concerns over any big sporting event, entertainment event, anything of that sort that brings people together in large numbers where the explosion of a device could cause maximum loss of life. The security authorities simply can't be sure, as we heard from Peter Clarke earlier, that this is a one-off incident.

We've certainly heard from the uncovering of previous plots of plans to attack not just places like government installations, but nightclubs, sporting venues and other places where people gather in large numbers. So, London and the whole of Britain will be on a very much heightened security alert over this weekend -- John.

ROBERTS: All right. Robin Oakley for us outside of Number 10 Downing Street, monitoring the new Brown government which was just established this morning and immediately has gone into crisis mode.

Robin, thanks. We'll get back to you this morning.

CHETRY: And if you are just waking up and joining us, wanting to figure out what's going on with the situation, we are covering the latest on a terror investigation out of London today because of a car bomb, a potential car bomb that was able to be diffused by police in London. And right now we are trying to piece together exactly what happened and what type of information we're getting.

We do know that inside of this silver Mercedes that you see there being loaded on to a truck, they found gas, petrol, as well as nails, large quanties of all of these materials. And we also heard from Scotland Yard that the explosives team was able to manually disable the detonator.

So we do know that there was something going on. We're just trying to find out more details now about who may have been behind it and what they are learning about the investigation.

For that, we're going to go to our homeland security correspondent, Jeanne Meserve, in our Washington, D.C., bureau.

Clearly, they are on heightened alert over in London. What is going on in terms of reaction from our homeland security people today, Jeanne?

JEANNE MESERVE, CNN HOMELAND SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, Kiran, a homeland security official says that there is no specific, credible intelligence indicating that there is any sort of threat here in the United States. That same sentiment echoed by an FBI official who told CNN there is no specific information of any threat here tied to the London bomb. There has been no change in the threat level or any portion of the threat level here in the United States, although one homeland official tells me that is something that is under discussion at this point this time.

In the meantime, the public is being urged to be alert. State, local and federal law enforcement is being urged to be vigilant.

A couple of additional points, Kiran. One is the forensics.

As has been mentioned, this car was found unexploded. It will be a gold mine of leads as they try and figure out who was responsible for placing this bomb.

And you heard the British official mention the CCTV cameras. Those are the closed circuit television cameras which are all over the city of London. They have sometimes provoked some controversy, but they have proved useful.

For instance, in the probe of the London subway bombings, it was those cameras that helped police figure out, identify who those were, who were responsible for those bombings. Those you can be sure are being looked at very closely today.

On a more disturbing note, the British authorities also have mentioned that there were these canisters of gas that were found in this vehicle. We don't know what that gas is. We don't know what its intention was. But there has been a lot of concern here in the United States about a phenomenon we've seen in Iraq, which is the explosion of vehicles with chemicals on board, specifically chlorine.

Of course, that vastly amplifies the effect of any explosion, because in addition to the preconcussion blast and any fragments that might be strewn about, now you also have a chemical that could be even more widely dispersed. Whether that was the intention here or not we don't know, but we do know that in the past U.S. authorities have sent advisories out to law enforcement just telling them about this phenomenon.

Also, of course, tremendous concern about vehicle bombs and how in the world you guard against those. There have been instances in New York City, for instance, where they have looked at trucks coming over bridges, going into the city, but we're talking here about a car that was loaded with explosives. How you get a handle on that beyond asking people to be vigilant and looking for things that are unusual is a little bit difficult to comprehend -- Kiran.

CHETRY: And we see it right here in New York City, as in other cities -- in D.C. as well, and other major cities where they have concrete barriers or something designed to look like a planter. But they're in front of buildings, they're in front of synagogues, unfortunately, so that people cannot drive close enough to those buildings to do this type of damage. This obviously was not the case in Haymarket outside of this Tiger Tiger nightclub.

MESERVE: That's right. That's right. You do see those sort of precautions, but there are plenty of other places where those precautions are not in place. And you see large groups of people gathering.

You know, any city center has places that at rush hour would be absolutely chock full of people. Coming up here next in the United States you will have July 4th celebrations. And although there will be, for instance, some sort of fencing up here on the Washington Mall, it's something that would not stop someone determined in a vehicle. So it's a big issue.

CHETRY: You know, the other interesting thing a lot of reporters were asking during this press conference with Scotland Yard, is this a solo operation? Are you looking into others? Are there fears of links or, you know, copycats in other places? And of course that's what comes to mind as well, and possibly is on the minds of our homeland security folks as well -- do they need to be alert and on be guard.

Are they talking about that at all?

MESERVE: Well, you can bet that when something like this happens anywhere in the world, they sit down and they look at the intelligence. Of course they look at it on a daily or an hourly basis anyway, but this would cause them to go back, look at things again. Perhaps see if there is some dots here that need to be connected.

But what we're being told at this point is no specific credible intelligence indicating there is any sort of threat here in the United States. They are viewing this as an isolated, localized event in Great Britain -- Kiran.

CHETRY: The only other bit of information that we received was the possibility of cell phone detonation. This was used, as we saw, to carry out the attacks in Bali. It's used on a daily basis, it seems, in Iraq as well. And we're getting word from different security officials it's not rocket science, that cell phone detonation is actually quite easy. MESERVE: That's right. And it's again something they have been most concerned about here.

Advisories sent to law enforcement about what to look for, how to prevent this if they possibly can. But, you know, this is the problem. You've got people in Iraq who are perfecting techniques that could then be deployed elsewhere in the world, around the United States. You have the Internet, which is spreading all kinds of information around the world about exactly how to put things together.

So an extraordinarily complex and difficult issue that they're going to have to address here.

CHETRY: Jeanne Meserve covering this issue from Washington.

We'll check back in with you throughout the morning as we continue to monitor and bring our audience the latest developments.

Thanks, Jeanne.

MESERVE: You bet.

ROBERTS: Twenty-six minutes now after the hour. A quick recap for you.

About 1:00 this morning, an ambulance was called to the Tiger Tiger nightclub in the Haymarket district of London. While on the scene, the ambulance attendant saw a suspicious vehicle, a silver Mercedes, parked outside that club. They said it had smoke inside.

They called the police. The police sent the bomb squad. The officers looked inside that vehicle, found several containers of gasoline, several gas canisters, what looked like to be explosive device, and, as well, a bunch of nails which would have been used as shrapnel.

They thought that it was urgent enough that they didn't want to wait for their automatic or at least remote detonation devices to get there, so they went inside the car and they manually disabled that bomb. Showing heroics early this morning there, because that could have gone off at any time.

Our Nic Robertson is on the scene there in Haymarket.

And Nic, if we are to heed the words of the deputy assistant commissioner, Peter Clarke, from Scotland Yard, the devastation there, had that bomb gone off, could have been terrible this morning.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely. The very nature of its construction designed to throw those nails, cause a fire bomb effect. And who knows what else until they get to the bottom of the details of what was contained in those cylinders.

But I think perhaps one thing was very telling during Peter Clarke's provision of information there. Before he was asked questions, he said of his own volition that, of course, there have been attacks in the past that have been planned against -- against nightclubs. The Ministry of Sound was the targeted nightclub at that time. It was targeted by an al Qaeda terror plotter here, Duram Barot (ph).

He was convicted recently in British courts, sent to jail. He was planning bombs to target nightclubs using limousines, using vehicles that could perhaps not stand out in a theater nightclub area like this, like the Mercedes vehicle, using gases, using fuel as an aid to the explosive effect.

So, by his own volition there, Peter Clarke really alluding to the fact here, without saying it explicitly, indeed, not tying this to al Qaeda, but really -- that Peter Clarke, himself, without being pressed by a question, making an allusion there to the fact there have been other al Qaeda plots that have targeted nightclubs before, perhaps that were proved to be significant. We know that he is being very careful to say that they're not tying this to anyone yet, that they really want to sift through all of the evidence very carefully before they make any links to any groups and any other plans.

But again, he did issue that warning for people to remain very vigilant. And of course it is that al Qaeda threat here that makes the police and makes Peter Clarke remind people here that there is a very, very big threat at this time -- John.

ROBERTS: Just as we're crossing the half hour here, Nic, we just want to remind our viewers that this is continuing coverage of a security alert in London.

A fairly significant bomb was found this morning outside of the Tiger Tiger nightclub in the very popular and densely-populated area of Haymarket. It was found before it went off. It was disabled by the Scotland Yard, the British police bomb squad. It was loaded on the back of a truck, has now been taken away for forensic examination.

Massive loss of life potentially averted this morning by some quick thinking on the part of a number of people. Nic, you filled an interesting blank here. I was wondering why a Mercedes would have been used in a car bombing. Typically they use throw away vehicles, not a luxury car like that, but as you said, that is something that might not have attracted attention in that part of the town.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That would be the initial, obvious conclusion. There are a lot of Mercedes in this area. There are obviously the London black mini cabs, but difficult with all the glass in one of those vehicles to conceal whatever what was inside. So perhaps the Mercedes vehicle, using that type of vehicle, not to stand out and not be noticed. Very interesting as well that Peter Clark said that he appealed for information that anyone may have had not only in the early hours of this morning about the movements of this particular vehicle, but also where that vehicle might have been, what people might have seen in this area all through the hours of Thursday evening.

So perhaps an indication here that the police feel that the vehicle had perhaps circled the area before, that there had been some reconnoitering, that there were perhaps other elements of potentially a team of people at work here. But, clearly, feeling that there was information to be gathered from the hours of late yesterday evening that this -- the vehicle didn't suddenly appear here in the early hours of this morning. That's when it was noticed that there were activities before that time. John?

ROBERTS: It will be interesting Nic to find out exactly when that vehicle was parked outside of that nightclub. Nic Robertson for us in the Haymarket district of London. Nic, thanks, we will get back to you. It's worth noting again that there are thousands of closed circuit television cameras all over London not just those that are monitoring security, but the also congested area charge cameras which get down in very close and they've got the license number up there. It's like a speed camera here in the United States. They -- it would seem to me, Christiane Amanpour, very easily track the movement of that vehicle.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Potentially and that's what they're really hoping for. He said that we are going to be going through all of these CCTV cameras. As you say, perhaps England, London is one of the most heavily saturated cities with the CCTV and it's paid dividends in terms of investigation and turning up evidence over the past. You remember, again, we go back to the two years ago, the London subway bombings and the bus that was blown up. In the first you really knew of what was happening was when they got the pictures out on the CCTV cameras.

KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR, AMERICAN MORNING: The interesting thing was there was also criticism it's controversial. A lot of people are talking about big brother and don't necessarily like that intrusion and said what good did it really do? We had pictures of the suspects after the fact. We didn't catch them before they were able to launch that attack.

AMANPOUR: I think in any free society there will always be that debate of how much surveillance is all right. I think London, frankly, has got used to it. This is not something new. It's been going on for a long time, CCTV and yes, it was after the fact the fact is that it does help with the investigations to try to, A, figure out what happened in this case and, B, to see whether they can glean any information that could help them try to prevent something in the future. But it is remarkable how much of a treasure trove those CCTV cameras have been.

ROBERTS: And of course in this particular case, since the bomber ran away, this is not an after the fact sort of thing. They've got the vehicle intact. They've got the bomb intact. They've got the materials inside intact and they probably have a pretty good photograph of who was driving that vehicle.

AMANPOUR: They do indeed and guess what, this is not just official areas that are monitored by CCTV. If you go to some of these highly rich areas of London, individuals have CCTVs all over their houses.

CHETRY: The other interesting thing. We hear from the former head of MI-5 at last year saying that they are monitoring some 1600 people that could be involved in some 200 suspected terror cells. That is a lot of cells.

AMANPOUR: It is a lot of cells and we've been reporting this for a while. I did a documentary on it called the war within for CNN, talking about, you know, what is it that causes people who have been basically born and bred in this country to turn up and turn against the government and sometimes their own people. And this is a new phenomenon or newish in the last two years, that the British intelligence, Scotland Yard, British police and the British community are having to take on board and having to really try to get to the bottom of it and there is no easy answer. Obviously, it's a real minority of people who do this. So far, one cell that has been successful and several others that have been disrupted. The taking liquid -- potential liquid explosives on a transatlantic airline this last August, that never happened. And they were able to prevent that. And now we've got this potential situation.

There's a big debate on how best -- and this is all over Europe -- how do you treat your significant minorities and Muslim minorities are huge all over Europe and to the vast extent, contribute to society and are peaceful and are part of their societies, but because of this politics and this division along Muslim and western lines, notably over Iraq, certainly, that all the intelligence people in England have said that Iraq is a motivating factor.

CHETRY: Before that, it was the Middle East conflict and the continuing --

AMANPOUR: We didn't have that in Europe.

ROBERTS: All right. Hey, we -- all this talk about closed circuit television cameras and tracing back it's worth going to Washington. Our Internet reporter Jacki Schechner has been looking into all this. What are you finding online Jacki?

JACKI SCHECHNER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We're just starting to see these eye witness accounts on the ground show up online just in the last few minutes or so. I want to show you some photos from the scene from Olivia in Laurent (ph) who says that he works about 50 meters from where this scene was. He took these about 9:30 this morning. You can see the police vehicles outside of the (INAUDIBLE). He said nobody in his office was able to get into work. It was all blocked off. He is currently uploading some more photos on to the group photo blog flicker.com and we're going to continue to check those as the morning progresses.

We have some other photos that are coming in from someone who calls himself Snapper Jack who says he also works I mag and I spy mag rather in the UK and these are photographs he took this morning on the scene in the area. You can see how it's cordoned off, the blue tarp over the area where investigators are working, where they found that Mercedes vehicle. You can see minimal press on the scene at this point but how all of those areas are blocked off.

We're been talking a lot about this Tiger Tiger nightclub where this vehicle was found outside of. Of course we haven't said that that's a target yet but we are seeing some photographs of the inside of this nightclub from their website. You can see where this is a multilevel club, several different areas. Perhaps it was packed with people, as John had mentioned earlier in this broadcast, it was ladies night. There was an event going on. So perhaps there were several people inside of this club. You have been talking also about cameras, closed circuit television cameras and the traffic cameras.

BBC online has the jam cam where you can basically click on these links and find out what the traffic is like in the area. This is the Picadilly Circus camera, so you can see not only here the government cameras. There are the traffic cameras. There is also cameras on the Internet for citizens. So the London area is well covered. There's a lot of surveillance so we're going to keep an eye on this. We're also going to keep an eye on the eyewitness accounts as they start to pour in on the Internet John, that's always the best way that we can get a sense of what the mood is like right there.

ROBERTS: All right, Jacki, thanks for bringing us that. Kiran's got something that she wants to ask you.

CHETRY: Speaking of the eyewitness accounts we're going to hear right now from a man. This is the gentleman whose car was parked next to the suspicious car, that silver Mercedes where they found the explosives and the gasoline as well as the nails. So let's listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, I'm here because my car is trapped right over there, right opposite where the bomb, the device was found. We came out for the evening, you know, last night, and when we returned to get into our car, the officers said, no, the place is cordoned off. They didn't tell us really at that stage what was going on. So my brother called me from island and said he saw on the news about what is really going on and that was a scary moment for me, you know? When I learned that there was such a device right opposite where I'm parked, you know?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So it is literally just across?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yeah, that red Volvo there right opposite.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did you see anything last night that led you to believe that something was going on?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, by the time we came to the car, the place was semi-cordoned off and they put a blue tent over. I didn't see exactly what -- at that time, we were so innocent, we didn't know what was -- it just shows how vigilant you got to be, you know? That any time anything can happen at any time, you know? I mean, that's the scary part because look how close I am. If that device had to go off while I'm there, definitely, I'll be damaged.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What time did you try to get back to your car?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: About 1:30, like 1:00. Like 1:00, the guy was there.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yeah, yeah. So as you look at that scene up there now from the bottom of the street, what are your thoughts? What are your feelings?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I thank the Lord that I'm still around today, you know? Because anything could happen. Who knows, you know? And like they say, the guy was driving reckless. If I go -- if I drive a car with bombs in, I would really drive safe, you know? I wouldn't drive reckless like that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHETRY: So there we hear from a gentleman whose car was parked next to that silver Mercedes, the one that was believed to be packed with fuel and nails. Christiane Amanpour, our chief international correspondent, just happened to be in New York visiting us today. It's a great opportunity for you to give us some perspective on this situation. What is the mood like? How do people feel and view the potential for terror in Britain?

AMANPOUR: It's long been said -- and it is a truism -- that the British do get up and get on with it. Even after 7/7 they did not just leave the subways and the buses. They did keep getting on with their life. Terrorism has been a part of British life for a long time since the troubles in Northern Ireland. There have been bombs. Obviously, the scale of what is going on, the subway bombings two years ago was of a much greater order but the notion that the homeland has been under attack has existed at least since World War II. Now having said that, they are also worried, of course they're worried because this is a new and nefarious kind of terrorism because it comes from within, some of it, as we've seen in the past. We really do not know who is behind whatever just happened in the Haymarket. Could it have been from the outside or not? I think that's also going to -- when we discover who it was, what it was, it will affect the mood and the way people think about this.

ROBERTS: There were a number of significant plots that have been disrupted in England in the wake of 2005, but even prior to that. Suspected bombings against other nightclubs in years past. The fact that this car got through, was sitting out in front of this nightclub, had smoke inside the passenger compartment, nobody was any the wiser for it. What kind of shock is that going to be to the system? We (INAUDIBLE) growing complacent that there really wasn't much of a terrorist threat after 2005 because they were disrupting these cells?

AMANPOUR: I don't think they were just complacent and I think every time you turn around, Scotland Yard makes a statement, the head of MI-5 makes a statement telling us that there are dozens of people if not hundreds and sometimes thousands who are being monitored, scores of these so-called terrorist cells being monitored. I don't think people are complacent, but certainly security has now become a part of life. Wherever you go, whether it's in shops, there are armed guards. Whether it's as much against shoplifting but against terrorism as well. The airports obviously, public transport areas. I think the good thing is that this didn't go off and I don't think it's by good fortune. It was noticed, it was seen, people reacted to it. Maybe --

ROBERTS: Unless the smoke inside the car was a failed detonation then it's only by the grace of God that people weren't killed. You have covered this extensively and a question people will be asking in this country today, 2005, the liquid explosive bomb plots against the airlines. What is going on in England?

AMANPOUR: It's a big question. It's one that we try to explore and we try to find out what is it about England which has for so long, had such a big and constructive group of immigrants. British Muslim immigrants, by and large, come from Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, all of those places which used to be called the colonies. And by and large, the vast majority of the immigrants and actually British citizens, second and third generation, are constructive, peaceful, moderate types, but over the last several years, a couple of things have happened. The politics, the world politics and the politics of war have radicalized a group that was prone to be radicalized. And there is a sense that unlike here in the United States where Muslims are much more assimilated, where their standard of life is quite high, a very good average here, where they consider themselves Americans and wanting to contribute to the American ideal and the American economy, the Muslims in Britain to an extent feel much more ghettoized, much less empowered, much less, you know, with much less opportunity whether it be in housing, in education and in the job force.

CHETRY: That is an interesting phenomenon. We also saw it in France with the riots and the problems that they have there and the situation is that something that in Europe is trying to - take a closer look at and solve?

ROBERTS: France doesn't seem to have the same problem with terrorism.

AMANPOUR: No, it does not. The fact of the matter is that France has the biggest Muslim majority, minority rather in Europe and it did have that internal problem with the burning of the inner city ghettos a couple of years ago. You know, one incredible quote that I just read from an old European basically said we asked for workers and we got people. This goes back decades to when Europe had to import labor to do the kinds of jobs that their upscale, increasingly upscale populations did not want to do. As European populations fell, they were importing labor who are people and they didn't know how to deal with the people once they got here and once they settled in and once they actually needed to be part of society. And that is an ongoing challenge for European nations, for the governments, for the whole community, because it's here to stay. This changing population across Europe is here to stay.

CHETRY: Christiane, we will check back in with you in just a few minutes. Right now we're going to John Pike with globalsecurity.org and we're getting some new information coming to us, John, from the Associated Press, quoting a British security official saying that there were similarities between the device found in this car and the detonation devices that are being used in vehicle bombs by insurgents in Iraq. JOHN PIKE, GLOBAL SECURITY ORGANIZATION: I think that you have to be concerned about that, the possibility that car bombings, this incredible wave of car bombs that we've been seeing in Iraq over the last year or two, that that is going to start migrating. We've already been concerned about different movements, different groups, cross-fertilizing and cross-training in Iraq. The rapidity with which they learn from each other, you do have to be concerned that that is starting to migrate from Iraq to other countries, Britain, maybe even the United States eventually.

CHETRY: They are also saying that MI-5 is going to be examining any possible connection between this incident and at least two similar foiled plots. One of them is that planned attack on the west end nightclub back in 2004 and a thwarted attempt to use limousines packed with gas canisters. In fact, Christiane said that trial is going on right out now as well.

PIKE: Well, I think that the important question here is to try to find the common author of these plots because generally when somebody figures out a good plan, he's going to continue to try to implement that plan as long as he thinks he can do it. So you would be concerned that you've got two layers here. You've got the people who are actually parking the cars, but then you have a layer above that that people who are planning it, the people who know how to build these things and those are the people that you're most concerned about.

CHETRY: As John pointed out as well what a wake-up call with all of the surveillance and all of the monitoring of suspected cells, to have this car bomb that, from what we gather and have been able to surmise from what we're hearing from Scotland Yard and the metropolitan police it just happened to not go off but it was certainly packed to the gills with gasoline and nails. There was certainly intent there. So is that a wake-up call for London?

PIKE: Well, I think that we can hope for the sort of good luck that we've had today but you can't plan on good luck. London has dealt with waves of bombings in the past but not on the scale of destructiveness that bombs like this would create. As we've seen in Iraq, this is a very difficult problem to counter by means other than simply finding the people who are authors of the attack and putting them in jail.

AMANPOUR: John, it's Christiane Amanpour in New York. You said common authors of these plots. I know you're talking about this particular plot, but do you think there is a strain, a linkage between many of these different cells? Or do you think they operate sort of on their own around the country?

PIKE: Of course, you know, that's a challenge. I mean on the one hand, we've seen, in many cases, where it's just a couple of people who take it into their mind to do a copycat attack. On the other hand, the FBI in particular, has always been looking for common threads for organized criminal activity, because as long as there's a possibility of organization, you have to go after who is organizing it or they're just going to keep organizing them. So you have to pursue both possibilities and both, I'm afraid, are equally worrisome. CHETRY: And the other thing is, you're trying to figure out whether or not it's someone who is just taking on the ideals of a group, saying yes, I'm linked to al Qaeda, when really there is no formal link to al Qaeda and that is something that we saw in the investigation of the 7/7 bombings in London.

PIKE: I think that looking for formal links to bin Laden, trying to get the wire transfer coming out of (INAUDIBLE), that is probably been overtaken by events. I think that at this point, al Qaeda, al Zawarhiri, that crew are operating much more on the level of ideological inspiration for some of these independent operators, but as we've seen with some of these prosecutions here in the United States, in the United Kingdom and elsewhere, people do try to organize themselves. You would like to be able to catch them before the plot is completed.

ROBERTS: John, it's John Roberts here.

PIKE: Hi.

ROBERTS: We've said several times that this bomb is very similar in construction to bombs that we've seen in Iraq. Does that suggest any connection to a group in Iraq or is this just a very simple way to put together a pretty effective explosive?

PIKE: We don't know yet do we. You're going to be looking for forensic evidence if there is something peculiar to a set of bombs they've seen in Iraq. At the same time one of the big concerns that American forces have had in Iraq is the rapidity with which independent groups are learning from each other how to do bomb construction. So that is the question they're going to be asking but at this point, obviously, no good answer.

CHETRY: John Pike with globalsecurity.org, thanks so much. We're just getting some new information coming from the London ambulance service spokesperson that shows just how arbitrary this discovery was. They're saying we can confirm that we received an emergency call to Haymarket shortly after 1:25 a.m. today, this is London time. While there, the crew noticed a suspicious vehicle with what they believed to be smoke inside and contacted our control room so the police could be alerted. They then go on to explain that other vehicles were then sent to the scene, remained on standby until shortly after 6:00 in the morning. The original patient, this was a man who was understood to have sustained a minor head injury after a fall was not taken to the hospital. So yet again, we're getting the news Christiane, getting confirmation now from this London ambulance service that it was just a routine call that discovered this.

AMANPOUR: Very lucky indeed.

ROBERTS: The real interesting part of this, too, is what was the smoke inside the vehicle from? Was that the explosion about to go off or was it a failed detonation? Because if it was a failed - if it about to go off, then the bomb squad officers who came in showed enormous heroics. If it was a failed detonation you can just imagine that only by the grace of God we escaped an enormous amount of carnage. We were talking with John Pike just a second ago about possible links to elsewhere with this bomb. Our Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr is at the Pentagon. She's monitoring that. Barbara, as we said to John Pike, very similar in construction to vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices or VBIEDs that we see in use daily across Iraq. Is there anything to suggest they may be connected or is it just the similarity in construction because you can put together a very powerful explosive device with ordinary household items.

BARBARA STARR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You certainly can John, but since the Iraq situation, military officials, civilian law enforcement and the intelligence community have been working very closely together on each of these explosions in Iraq trying to develop the forensics, look at the signatures of the bomb makers in Iraq and they have quite a catalog of evidence and information about the various groups, how they put their bombs together and what they do. So I think one can only imagine that British authorities will probably be talking to U.S. authorities, looking at some of that data that's been collected in Iraq.

When you talk about forensics, that's exactly what they look at in Iraq, after every one of these deadly explosions that we've all seen so much of on television and they look at the fusing. What you were just talking about, the potential of a failed detonation, what they try and look at is how a bomb is fused. Many bomb makers leave their own signature in this critical part. Was it sophisticated enough and fused in a sophisticated manner for the potential of a massive explosion? Or was it, as you say, possibly a failed detonation? Was it possibly not very sophisticated, not a sophisticated fuse? Only part of it really set to go off. Those are the kinds of things that they're going to look at.

Since Iraq, it's really the case that this type of very basic bomb technology has really spread around the world. As we've all said, it's not really new. It's been seen in northern Ireland, in Lebanon, in Israel, even in Oklahoma City, tragically, but since Iraq, really the significant change, if you will, is there is a significant body of forensics of data and of evidence and I think that you can imagine that British authorities will be looking at some of that, trying to see if, if they can find that connection to any group operating in Iraq John.

ROBERTS: Barbara, we're getting differing accounts of what happened immediately before this bomb in the car was discovered. One was that the driver was driving erratically, crashed into some trash bins outside of this club, fled the scene, another that the car was just there, ambulance attendants saw smoke inside the vehicle. If the driver was driving erratically, smashed into these bins and ran away, it suggests a couple of things. It suggests either that this was not a suicide attack, this was a planned attack to park the car somewhere and then detonate it remotely or perhaps it was a suicide attack that the driver got skittish about and bailed out of. When we look at these vehicle borne improvised explosive vehicles in Iraq, do you have any idea what the ratio is of how many of those are suicide compared to how many are planted and detonated remotely? STARR: An awful lot of them have been suicide car bomb attacks when they approach checkpoints either outside of Iraqi police stations, U.S. military bases or in these marketplaces. And, you know, these are just very, very difficult to stop. I think anybody will tell you a determined suicide car bomber can, you know, get to a detonation point, detonate his weapon and there is not an awful lot you can do about it. I mean, you know, in an urban city, it's not the case that you can really stop it. But you're right. What we really don't know, of course, is what was going on in those initial minutes.

Again, did the potential bomber see some indication that the device was about to go off, he was trying to get out of the car perhaps? Was it a determined suicide bomber? All of these things are the types of things that they're going to look at and that I think you can guarantee intelligence services in Britain and in the U.S. will be cooperating on. But you know John, there is another slight wrinkle here. It's only been in the past few weeks we have also heard about the threat of al Qaeda type bomb attacks in Germany. The German authorities have been speaking about this publicly and that is also something that the U.S. military is watching very carefully. So there is a notion out there that we're in an era right now where this is a potential growing threat in western Europe.

ROBERTS: What is the Pentagon saying about that Barbara? Are these groups that are actually linked to al Qaeda and Iraq or simply influenced by?

STARR: Very tough business to figure that out these days, John. There is al Qaeda central, if you will. As John Pike was talking, the Pakistan version of al Qaeda, the original al Qaeda, now al Qaeda in Iraq really overtaking that, if you will, in terms of its influence. There's a lot of evidence to show, in fact, that al Qaeda operatives in Iraq are now exporting their technology, their personnel out of Iraq. There are links to Iran. There are links to Syria, to Hezbollah operating in places like Lebanon. What was al Qaeda in Iraq is certainly becoming more of a movement that is crossing national borders and is beginning to move. If they determine that there is some forensic link between this situation in London and groups operating in Iraq, I think that would be determined to be very significant by intelligence services. John?

ROBERTS: Al Qaeda perhaps more of a movement now than an actual organization. Barbara Starr for us at the Pentagon, Barbara, thanks. We will let you continue working the phones. We'll get back to you a little bit later on this morning.

CHETRY: We're fortunate to get some great firsthand perspective from our chief international correspondent Christiane Amanpour who joins us in New York today. As Barbara Starr talked about the phenomenon of al Qaeda in Iraq possibly spreading, you talk about the war really being a linchpin to getting more people radicalized and willing to carry out these types of attacks. But you talked about the vast majority of Muslims in England being moderate. What is their response to these more radicalized factions within their religion?

AMANPOUR: They, obviously, are against it. They know that this is something that puts a bad black mark over all of them and they resent being, you know, lumped in with some of these terrorists who have been discovered to be home-grown terrorists over the last few years. There is however a real debate on how do you deal with this situation? How do you bring the potential terrorists out from the cold and back into society? Or how do you find them and how do you deal with them? And that has caused a lot of contention.

The outgoing home secretary, John Reed (ph), he has now been replaced by Jackie Smith, the outgoing home secretary used to go around some of the neighborhoods, some of the heavily Muslim neighborhoods around London and he asked parents to watch their children, to look out to basically, you know, report if anything seemed untoward in their own communities, right down into their own households and families. Now, this caused a lot of uproar, as you can imagine. People were livid that the government would ask them to spy on their own children, on their own families.

On the other hand, some people said, well, actually, we do need to be more vigilant. We do need to take care of our kids, take care of our youth and not just parents, but the whole community and we need to know what's going on. So there is a real struggle to try to figure out how to separate those who might be inclined to radicalism from the body politic and how to observe and make sure that this doesn't get to the situation where it has in the past. But, again, remember, there's still real minorities. These are only one or two situations. It's not like it's happening every week or every day even though they're watching people.

CHETRY: And we've seen it isolated incidents on planes. Yet it affects everybody.

AMANPOUR: That's for sure. The effect is huge.

CHETRY: It is. Christiane, stick with us please. The next hour of AMERICAN MORNING starts right now.

ROBERTS: Breaking news, London on terror alert.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have a serious and continued security threat.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERTS: A potential car bomb diffused in the heart of the city.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If the device had detonated, there could have been significant injury or loss of life. The threat from terrorism is real. It is here. And it is enduring.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I thank the lord that I'm still around.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERTS: Good morning to you. It is Friday, the 29th of June. I'm John Roberts along with Kiran Chetry and CNN's chief international correspondent Christiane Amanpour. Following this morning, breaking news out of London that occurred early this morning London time about 6:00 in the morning our time. Here is what we know. Actually, sorry, no, it would have been about 9:00 at night our time.

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