Police arrest suspected July 21 bomber

BIRMINGHAM, England -- Police pursuing suspects in the failed July 21 terror bombings in London raided four homes across Britain on Wednesday and detained four people, including a Somali man believed to be one of the fugitive bombers, media reports and a witness said.\nThe man was subdued with a stun gun when officers stormed a home in Birmingham before dawn. Members of the bomb squad, some dressed in armored suits, were seen entering the home after police evacuated 100 nearby residences in a quiet, ethnically mixed neighborhood of Britain's second-largest city.\nPrime Minister Tony Blair, without commenting on the man's identity, described the arrest as "an important development."\nThree more men were arrested in a pre-dawn raid at another home about two miles away in this city 120 miles northwest of London. The raids were carried out by 50 officers from London's Metropolitan Police Anti-Terrorist Branch and West Midlands Police. No shots were fired.\nIn London, police said they raided two homes at 6 a.m. in the northern neighborhoods of Finchley and Enfield. No arrests were made, but forensic examinations were under way at the residences, a spokeswoman said, speaking on customary condition of anonymity. She declined further comment.\nAuthorities said the four raids involved the investigation into the July 21 attack, during which bombs planted on three London subway trains and a bus failed to detonate fully. The attack came two weeks after four suicide bombers staged a similar assault that killed 52 other people.\nMeanwhile, police arrested a man at Luton airport near London under anti-terrorism laws as he prepared to leave on a flight for France, authorities said. Police did not say why he was detained or if the arrest was connected with the London attacks.\nTwo men also were arrested late Tuesday on suspicion of terrorism while traveling on a train in the Midlands region. Police said the train, which was on its way to London's King's Cross station from Newcastle, was stopped at Grantham and the men were taken off. It was not immediately clear if the arrests were linked to the investigation into the London bombings.\nAuthorities would not confirm BBC and Sky News reports that the Tasered man was Yasin Hassan Omar, a 24-year-old Somali suspected of trying to blow up a subway train near Warren Street station.\nAt least one witness said the man resembled Omar.\n"I looked out of the window and the road was full of armed police and they had got the road closed off," said electrician Andy Wilkinson, who lives nearby.\nHe said the suspect looked like Omar but could not confirm it was him.\n"After 10 or 15 minutes, they brought a guy out. He looked like the darkest-skinned one in the photos of the four suspects released by the police -- the one with the curly hair," Wilkinson said. "They had him dressed in one of those white suits. He had plastic cuffs on the front."\nSuch suits are used by police to preserve any physical evidence that may be on a suspect.\n"I think it is an important development," Blair, in London, said of the arrest. "Obviously we are greatly heartened by the operations today. The police have been working extraordinarily hard on this and have shown a tremendous amount of commitment and dedication to the task in hand."\nPolice launched a manhunt after releasing images of four men thought responsible for planting the July 21 bombs. The pictures have been plastered over much of London's transit and railway system while police have for more than a week released various details about the attackers.\nOn Monday, they released the names of two of the suspects, Omar and Muktar Said Ibrahim, 27, also known as Muktar Mohammed Said. Both came to Britain as the children of refugees, the government said.\nOmar arrived from Somalia in 1992 at age 11 and has British residency, the Home Office said. Said came in 1990 from Eritrea, his family said, and officials said he was granted residency in 1992 and British citizenship in September 2004\nPolice have been trying to determine whether the failed July 21 bombings were connected to the deadly July 7 attacks.\nThe Birmingham arrests would bring the number of people that police have said are being held in connection with the July 21 bombings to nine.