London Bombing Mastermind Captured In Pakistan

From The Times Online,

The British al-Qaeda leader linked to the London terrorist attacks was being questioned by police in Pakistan last night after the discovery o mobile phone records detailing his calls with the suicide bombers.

Haroon Rashid Aswat has emerged as the figure that Scotland Yard have been hunting since he flew out of Britain just hours before the attacks which killed 56 people.

Aswat, 30, who is believed to come from the same West Yorkshire town as one of the bombers, arrived in Britain a fortnight before the attacks to orchestrate final planning for the atrocity. He spoke to the suicide team on his mobile phone a few hours before the four men blew themselves up and killed fifty-two other people.

Intelligence sources told The Times that during his stay Aswat visited the home towns of all four bombers as well as selecting targets in London. He’s also said to have trained at an terrorist training camp in Afghanistan which was visited by Osama Bin Laden, and has been linked to two of Bin Laden’s planners and an Al Qaeda suspect held in America.

Update: Australia’s ABC network show Lateline reports:

Britain’s High Commissioner to Pakistan has tonight denied reports that the mastermind of the London bombings had been captured by police. Earlier this evening it had been reported that the British-born Haroon Rashid Aswat had been picked up as part of a series of raids in Pakistan. The suspect is thought to have flown out of Britain just before the attacks.

There was a crackdown on extremists in Pakistan, and 100 or so suspected terrorists were arrested, just not Aswat.

He’s got a long way to go before he catches up to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in the erroneous capture reports…