Terror investigators focus on Cambridge links

Five of the eight suspects in the London and Glasgow bomb plots were in Cambridge together at a time when they began to embrace fundamentalist Islam for the first time.

Piecing together the links between the members of the group, the security services have come across repeated references to the city.

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Cambridge, where Philby, MacLean and Burgess were radicalised in the Thirties before becoming Soviet spies, had become a place where jihadist tenets were being discussed among young Muslims in the early part of this decade.

Seven of those arrested are said to be based in the health sector. The US television channel ABC News reported that a syringe was part of the firing mechanism for the London bombs, but this was not confirmed by the police.

Investigators are coming round to a view that the Iraqi doctor Bilal Abdulla was the leading advocate of violent action against the perceived iniquities of the West. Angered by the US-led invasion, Dr Abdulla is said to have become embittered by the suffering of his family and friends in the anarchy which followed. While many middle-class Iraqis were trying to escape their homeland, Abdulla's trips back to Iraq increased.

At Cambridge, which he visited before and after the invasion of Iraq, Abdulla is said to have met Dr Sabeel Ahmed and his brother Khafeel, Indian Muslims from Bangalore. Khafeel Ahmed, it is claimed, later went on, with Abdulla, to try to carry out the London and Glasgow bombings. Khafeel Ahmed and Dr Abdulla, were "best mates", their associate in Cambridge Shiraz Maher told BBC Newsnight. Mr Maher, a former member of the militant Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir, has said Dr Abdulla was radicalised by the events in Iraq. A spokesman for Hizb ut-Tahrir last night denied that any of its members were involved with the men arrested. Sabeel Ahmed was arrested by police in Liverpool after being hit by a Taser gun after a two-hour stand-off.

Also living in Cambridge was Dr Mohammed Asha, a neurosurgeon. He worked at Addenbrooke's Hospital, along with his wife, Marwa. Dr Asha and Dr Abdulla knew each other from Amman, Jordan.

More than one of the suspects had links with Anglia Ruskin University. A spokeswoman said: "At this time identities are still unclear; it would be inappropriate to comment further."

Police have searched a Cambridge address where Dr Abdulla had rented a room from a mosque. They have also carried out inquiries at Muslim centres and searched internet sites to try to track extremist activity in the city.