Police shoot, wound man in London antiterror raid

LONDON -- Police shot and wounded a man during a raid in east London early yesterday and arrested him and another man on suspicion of terrorism.

Neighbors said police, some in hazardous-materials suits, quietly moved into the ethnically-mixed neighborhood before dawn and surrounded the house of a man, his wife, and their four teenage children. The neighbors described seeing a man in a bloodstained T-shirt being carried out of the house.

The man who was shot was hospitalized with injuries that were not life-threatening, officials said.

Deborah Glass of the Independent Police Complaints Commission said a single shot had been fired.

Peter Clarke, Anti-Terrorist Branch head, said police planned the raid to protect the public ``from firearms or from hazardous substances" after receiving ``very specific" intelligence. Neighbors said the area was swarmed by police in protective gear. A member of the Metropolitan Police Authority said officers wore suits to protect against chemicals and radioactivity.

Metropolitan Police said the wounded man, 23, was suspected of instigating, preparing, and committing terrorist acts.

Another man, 20, was arrested at the house under the Terrorism Act and held at the high-security Paddington Green police station.

Two other people in the house during the raid were treated, possibly for shock, and released from a hospital, a police spokeswoman said on the condition of anonymity in line with departmental policy.

``An examination of the officers' firearms confirms that a single shot was discharged in circumstances which are currently under investigation," Glass said. She declined to say whether the man who was shot had been armed.

Dimple Hirani, 21, who lives nearby, said she saw ``loads of police and loads of vans." The police had special uniforms, gloves, and equipment, she said.

Shopkeeper Salim Mala said that the streets were sealed off when he arrived for work and that plainclothes police wearing protective suits were combing the area.

Some neighbors said the family had lived for years in the neighborhood, a mixture of Bengali, Pakistani, Eastern European, and British residents.

The raid followed discussions between the Security Service, the Anti-Terrorist Branch, and biochemical specialists from the Health Protection Agency, police said.

Police said officers used a search warrant under the authority of the Terrorism Act in a raid described as ``intelligence-led."

Authorities declined to describe the intelligence that prompted the raid, and said an examination of the house could continue for several days.