Global Security Newswire

U.S. and British intelligence intercepts of telephone conversations helped to derail a planned chemical weapons attack in London, the London Independent reported today (see GSN, April 6).

The plan allegedly involved the use of bombs consisting of conventional explosives and the chemical osmium tetroxide. Potential targets included the London Underground subway system and London’s Gatwick and Heathrow airports, according to the Independent. The plan was foiled, in part, after U.S. and British intelligence agencies intercepted telephone calls among eight suspected terrorists within the United Kingdom and calls made to Pakistan, the Independent reported. The eight suspects have were arrested last week.

Steve Simpson, a senior chemistry lecturer at the University of Salford, warned of the effects of osmium tetroxide.

“If you get the vapor in your eyes, even a small amount, it can turn them brown or black and you could be permanently blinded. It is so volatile that one could be in appreciable danger just opening a bottle,” Simpson said (Kim Sengupta, London Independent, April 7).

The chemical, which costs about $30 per gram, would be easy for terrorists to disperse in a confined space, said John Henry, a toxicology professor at St. Mary’s Hospital in London. “It vaporizes at room temperature and, if you breathe in the fumes, they cause severe lung edema,” which would lead to severe loss of breath, he said.

Osmium tetroxide would probably not cause as much harm as a chemical agent such as sarin, said Andrea Sella, an inorganic chemist at University College London (Clive Cookson, Financial Times, April 6).

British Home Secretary David Blunkett said today that the foiled chemical weapons plot validates the government’s decision to implement antiterrorism measures.

The public should be “praising and being very grateful that we have the security and counterterrorism services we do because they are doing a first-class job,” Blunkett said. “They have got my whole-hearted backing because this is the only protection we really have,” he added (James Lyons, Press Association, April 7).