Landing the Big One

Landing the Big One

Saturday, December 10, 2005

PM Blair warned- Cruise ships and oil tankers terrorist targets


Says here:
URGENT action needs to be taken to stop al-Qaeda attacking cruise liners and oil tankers, Tony Blair has been warned.

Maritime security is the weak link in the defence against another 9/11-style outrage, says an international agreement on combating terror.

The document, agreed by the Prime Minister and more than 30 other world leaders, said more must be done to lessen the "serious" risk of an attack at sea.

The warning comes after pirates attacked luxury cruise liner Seabourn Spirit off the coast of Africa last month with guns and rockets.

Security sources fear the raid could inspire terrorists to launch a Christmas spectacular against a passenger ship causing mass casualties. A security source told the Mirror: "Al-Qaeda has the aim of targeting weak links in the global economy.

"Given most of the 80 million barrels of oil the world uses every day is transported by sea, shipping is a high-value, low-risk target." Experts have warned that cruise ships with up to 5,000 passengers could be sunk by a small number of terrorists.

And suicide assaults against oil tankers could be made using small speedboats packed with explosives.

Such an attack in the English Channel - the world's busiest shipping lane - would cause economic damage and be an environmental disaster.
Let's see, where have we heard this before? Maybe here or here or here or here among other places.

No comments:

Post a Comment