Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, an affilate of the terrorist organisation, have offered to free a British-South African hostage if Abu Qatada, the radical cleric, is allowed to choose a country for his extradition, according to the US monitoring service SITE.
AQIM also threatened that Britain would "open the door of evil" unto its country and people should it send the imam back to his native Jordan where he faces jail, the report said.
The group which is Al-Qaeda's North African franchise - has been holding Stephen Malcolm and two other western men hostage since abducting them last November in the northern Mali desert city of Timbuktu.
Britain has been trying to deport Abu Qatada for more than six years, arguing he is a threat to national security, to Jordan, where the cleric was convicted in 1998 in absentia of involvement in terror attacks. But his removal has in the past been blocked by the European Court of Human Rights, which cited the risk that evidence obtained from torture would be used against him on his return to Jordan.
The court is now considering the latest appeal by the cleric.
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Six sites, including two residential complexes, are being tested as launch pads for missile systems capable of thwarting any airborne terror attack.
Starstreak and Rapier missile systems - which have a range of around 4 miles - would be deployed as a "last resort" to shoot down any low flying aircraft intending a 9/11 style suicide mission at one of the Olympic venues.
Defence sources claim radar would identify rogue aircraft and the missiles would be deployed long before they reached built up areas.
But experts have claimed that the systems are useless in poor weather as they rely on the operator being able to see the target.
Nick Brown, editor in chief of IHS Jane's International Defence Review said: "The system's weakness is that the missiles are laser-guided, steered onto their target by the soldier keeping his sight on an aircraft. So if the soldier can't see an aircraft, they can't hit it.
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#3
Is it just me, or is anyone else getting the feeling the Brits actually want to shoot down or blow up in mid-air the event-winning BallShots from opposing foreign teams???
#5
HOw many airfields in England? Certainly there can put a security guy at each monitoring things and if someone tries to fly in from out of the country the RAF should take them out. I'm not sure I get this missile thing.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
