The second, another Mercedes, was dumped in the area and its deadly cargo discovered by parking wardens who had towed it - unwittingly - to a car pound. They became suspicious of a strong smell of petrol or gas.
MI5 cancelled leave for its frontline staff and security was stepped up at "iconic targets", with uniformed police patrols also increased. Security plans for weekend events from Wimbledon to a Gay Pride march in London were under review.
Two Baghdad-style explosions 'to kill 100s' Hero cop thwarts 900ft fireball at club is the headline in the Mirror
The silver 1990 E-class Mercedes saloon was packed with eight propane gas cylinders, 60 litres of fuel in a dozen petrol cans plus another 30 in its tank and fistfuls of lethal three and six-inch nails.
Parked outside a Haymarket nightclub packed with 1,000 revellers, the Baghdad-style bomb could have killed and injured hundreds, laying waste to people and property in a 300-yard radius.
Cops are convinced the huge device — stuffed with nails — was meant to explode at 2am just when revellers were leaving.
The Mercedes - made safe by explosives officers - parked outside Tiger TigerNightclubs have long been a favourite target of Al Qaeda and Islamic radicals planning to bring slaughter and terror to the heart of major Western cities.
To the fundamentalist, the clubs with their sale of alcohol, often scantily dressed young women, loud music and decadent behaviour epitomise everything they abhor about the West.
They are obvious "impact targets" for a spectacular attack because they occupy a controlled space and explosions are likely to result in a large death toll and horrific injuries.
THE demands of overseeing Britain’s security were made clear to new Home Secretary Jacqui Smith yesterday in an early-morning phone call.
The Cabinet newcomer – the first woman in the post – was awakened and told of the attempted terrorist attack in central London.By 7.30am she was meeting with security chiefs and civil servants before chairing her first meeting of the Cabinet terror crisis group Cobra.In what was her first full day in the job, she found herself warning the nation of the “most severe and sustained threat to our security from international terrorism” after the thwarted car bombing in Haymarket.
The incident also appeared to be foreshadowed by a posting on an internet forum used by terrorists, saying: “Today I say: Rejoice, by Allah. London will be bombed.”
Sir Ian Blair, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, gave warning recently that car and lorry bombs were “the greatest danger” facing Britain.
According to YouGov, 38 per cent of voters would back Labour at an early general election - a five-point increase since last month - suggesting Mr Brown could use a "honeymoon election" to seek his own mandate.
The poll, the first since Mr Brown became prime minister on Wednesday, shows Labour soaring seven points to 39%, a clear four-point lead over the Conservatives and its first lead in an ICM poll since March 2006.
The result is Labour's best performance in an ICM poll since David Cameron became Tory leader in 2005. If repeated at a general election it would see Labour increase its majority at Westminster.
Plans to free the non-dangerous prisoners in an effort to ease prison overcrowding were set out two weeks ago.
A total of 25,500 prisoners are expected to be freed up to 18 days early over the course of a year.
Jack Straw, the newly appointed Lord Chancellor and Justice Secretary, defended the move, saying that criminals freed early would be “carefully selected” by prison governors
On a day dominated by the London bomb alert, the Prime Minister unveiled a wider ministerial team which stepped up the battle against terrorism at home and abroad.
He reached beyond narrow party political lines to appoint Admiral Sir Alan West, the former head of the Royal Navy who once expressed doubts over the legality of the Iraq war, as Security Minister at the Home Office.
Ex-Scotland Yard commissioner Lord Stevens, head of David Cameron's UK border police task force, will be Mr Brown's adviser on international security.
And MP for Dewsbury Shahid Malik became the first ever Muslim member of a British Government. The new ministerial team was already being drawn up before yesteday's failed attacks, but many of the posts reflect a renewed antiterror drive.
The central control, based at Worcester, will gather information from emergency services nationwide and improve the availability of help to the worst-affected areas.
Fire chiefs have admitted that they struggled to cope with the scale of the floods and that many staff were near to collapse after working around the clock for three days.
DOWNPOURS forecast for this weekend could trigger fresh floods, experts warned last night.
The Met Office’s severe weather warning for the entire weekend predicts 25mm (one inch) of rainfall “quite widely” across England and Wales.But it adds: “There is a risk that local totals could reach 50mm (two inches).”This could cause mayhem in rain-sodden areas still struggling to recover from Monday’s deluge.
"The military plans have been worked out in the finest detail. The government knows these plans and agrees with them," Mr Gul told Turkey's Radikal newspaper. "If neither the Iraqi government nor the US occupying forces can do this [crush the PKK], we will take our own decision and implement it," Mr Gul said. The foreign minister's uncharacteristically hawkish remarks were seen as a response to pressure from Turkey's generals, who have deployed some 20,000-30,000 troops along the borders with Iraq, and who are itching to move against the rebels they say are slipping across the border to stage attacks inside Turkey.
Court to review Guantanamo detainee appeals reports the Telegraph
In what appears to have been a decisive factor, lawyers for the detainees last week filed a statement from a US military officer describing as inadequate the process used for the past four years to classify them as enemy combatants.
The court's nine justices made the unusual reversal of their previous stance without comment. In April, the court turned down an identical request, though two of the justices indicated that they could be persuaded to change their minds.
Johaina Aamer recalls very little of the final precious moments she spent with her father before the bombs started falling in Afghanistan.
She remembers him pretending to be a lion and chasing her and her two brothers around the garden and then running for cover as the explosions crept closer. After that, her mind is blank.
But in paintings and pictures the nine-year-old has unlocked her subconscious to tell a horrifying story of the American invasion, her father's capture and his 2,000 days spent as a prisoner in Guantanamo Bay.
The same paper reports that
Bush looks to his father to mend relations with Putin
Tomorrow's summit between George Bush and Vladimir Putin raises the intriguing question of whether the shadow of the father can help the son bring an end to the frostiest period in ties between the United States and Russia since the Cold War?
For the first time in his six-and-a-half years in power, Mr Bush is inviting a foreign dignitary not to the White House, or the Camp David retreat, or his ranch in Texas. This meeting takes place at the home of Mr Bush's father in Kennebunkport, Maine. The former president's deft handling of US-Soviet relations was a hallmark of his term in office.
The White House confirmed yesterday that the 41st president will be at the house while his son entertains Mr Putin. Although he will not take part in the official talks, the elder Bush is bound to be involved informally as the two leaders address the host of grievances that divide them.
The Times is reporting that
Poles smudge EU agreement before the ink has even dried
A deal on Europe’s future, stitched together at last week’s bad-tempered summit, began to unravel yesterday after the intervention of the EU’s most unpredictable leader.
Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the Polish Prime Minister, who sent his brother Lech, the President, to the summit, stunned Brussels by declaring his determination to renegotiate the compromise. The twins spent much of last week’s detailed negotiations on the phone to each other and Lech had said that his brother was content with the package. But Jaroslaw, who demanded extra voting power for Poland, insisted yesterday that the deal had not taken full account of Poland’s demands.
EU anger as 'awkward' Poland goes back on deal says the Mail
The EU deal on a replacement for the discredited constitution was in danger of unravelling last night after Poland demanded extra concessions.
The former Soviet satellite's hard-line premier said he would re-open negotiations on the agreement hammered out in Brussels a week ago.
Poland has emerged as a one-nation "awkward squad" in the 27-member EU, angering the club's big players
£900k stupid Buga fined £400 reports the Sun
A DRIVER who wrecked a £925,000 supercar in Britain’s most expensive crash was yesterday fined just £400.
Ajay Soni, 39, lost control of his Bugatti Veyron, one of only 12 in the UK and 300 in the world, as he accelerated in wet weather.
The car, capable of 253mph, ended up a virtual write-off after it hit an oncoming Vauxhall Astra — in which a pregnant woman was a passenger — at an accident blackspot.
Finally the Mirror ahead of tomorrows smoking ban reports from
BRITAIN'S SMOKIEST PUB..
..THEY ARE DEFYING THE NEW BAN UP TO THE.. LAST GASP
THERE'S so much puffing going on in this boozer that only regulars can find the bar through the tobacco haze - at least that's what the locals tell me.
Welcome to Britain's smokiest pub. The Coach & Horses is where, legend has it, the previous owner tried to ban non-smokers for bringing the place into disrepute.
And although no one has bothered to count them, I'm told there are 200 often-overflowing ashtrays dotted around the tables of this intimate, Central London watering hole.
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