Security tightened on New York subway over terror threat
 

NEW YORK, Friday (AFP)

New York ramped up security on its subway system after receiving what officials described as the most specific threat to date of a terrorist attack in the coming days.

"This is the first time that we have had a threat with this level of specificity," Mayor Michael Bloomberg said. "It was more specific as to target, it was more specific as to timing."

Although the intelligence behind the alert had yet to be corroborated, Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said it had been deemed of "sufficient concern" to enhance counter-terrorism operations on the subway network, as well as buses and ferries.

Officials refused to provide details of the precise nature of the threat, although Kelly said an existing policy of random searches on the subway would be intensified, with a particular emphasis on baggage and baby strollers.

Despite the increased security, subways were running as normal and New York City remained at terrorist level orange, the second highest level, which has been in force here ever since the September 11, 2001 attack on the World Trade Center. The head of the FBI's New York field office, Mark Mershon, said the new threat had been "partially disrupted" but declined to elaborate beyond confirming that no arrests had been made in the city itself.

CNN quoted a senior Pentagon official as saying US troops, acting on the same intelligence, had taken part in a raid south of Baghdad on Wednesday night and rounded up several Al-Qaeda operatives. Bloomberg said the warning of the attack had come several days ago, but a public announcement was delayed.

"There were operations taking place that we thought were in the interest of ending the threat, and to release the information earlier could have jeopardised the lives of those conducting those operations," he said.

The new warning came just hours after a major speech on terrorism by President George W. Bush in which he sought to convince Americans that Iraq was a central front of the anti-terror campaign.

Bush said the United States had foiled three Al-Qaeda terror strikes on its soil since the September 11 attacks, and stopped terror groups casing US targets and infiltrating operatives into the country.

"Evil men obsessed with ambition and unburdened by conscience must be taken very seriously and we must stop them before their crimes multiply," Bush said.

In the immediate wake of the July suicide bombings on the London transport system that claimed 52 lives, New York flooded its subway network with police patrols and introduced a policy of random bag searches.

The New York subway - fourth largest in the world in passenger volume - carries 4.5 million passengers on an average working day.

"We've never had before a specific threat to our subway system," Bloomberg said.

"There have been people all the time on the Internet and every place else, saying you know...'I'm going to go get those guys'," he said. "But suffice it to say (this time) its importance was enhanced above the normal level, by the detail that was available to us."

In a city that still bears the physical and psychological scars of the September 11 attack four years ago, the presence of police, anti-terrorist units and National Guard troopers has become a common feature of subway travel. Bloomberg's press briefing came in the middle of the evening rush hour and many subway passengers said they were unaware of the new threat.