All Four Suspects in Failed July 21 Bombings Reported to Be in Custody

LONDON (AP) - Raids in London and Rome on Friday rounded up the last of the four suspected attackers from the failed July 21 transit bombings in Britain, officials and media reports said.

Two of the suspects were picked up in west London following raids by heavily armed police, the reports said. London police did not confirm their identities.

Italian police in Rome arrested Osman Hussain, a naturalized British citizen from Somalia, as part of an ongoing investigation in the bombings, said Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu. Hussain was "the fourth attacker," he said.

Police raided two residences Friday in west London, arresting two men at one address and one at another, a Metropolitan Police spokesman said on customary condition of anonymity.

So far, about two dozen people have been arrested in connection with the attacks last week in which bombs in backpacks failed to detonate fully on three subway trains and a double-decker bus. Those attacks caused no injuries, unlike the July 7 attacks in London that killed 56 people, including the four suicide bombers.

The police operation was carried out in at least two locations in Notting Hill about a quarter-mile apart.

Britain's Press Association said one of those arrested was believed to be Muktar Said Ibrahim, 27, who allegedly tried to blow himself up on a double-decker bus in east London.

Ibrahim, also known as Muktar Mohammed Said, came to Britain in 1990 from Eritrea.

The second suspect arrested in London is believed to have been responsible for the attempted bombing near Oval Tube station, Press Association said. Not yet identified by police, he was pictured running from the Oval Street subway station wearing a "New York" sweatshirt.

Hussain is suspected of targeting a subway train near the Shepherd's Bush station. He was shown on closed-circuit TV footage wearing a backpack in the Westbourne Park station.

An official at the British Embassy in Rome said the arrest was carried out as part of a joint investigation between Rome and Scotland Yard. Embassy spokesman Geoffrey Watson said he could not comment further because the investigation was ongoing.

The first of the four suspects, Yasin Hassan Omar, was arrested during a dramatic raid Wednesday in Birmingham in central England. The 24-year-old Omar, a Somali citizen with British residency, is suspected of attacking a train near the Warren Street subway station.

In Friday's raids in west London, Sky News broadcast video of two men in light blue bodysuits designed to preserve evidence leading away a man in a white bodysuit, shielding his face.

In addition, a witness told The Associated Press that a man wearing what appeared to be a bus driver's uniform was led away by police in handcuffs.

The witness, Osama Ahmed Ali, saw a Somali man whom he recognized as a bus driver.

"He was in a purple-and-yellow bus driver uniform," said Ali, 16. "I've been on a bus with him a couple of times."

Police also arrested two women at the Liverpool Street train station in central London and evacuated the area. One woman is believed to have been in a line for the Stansted Express, which goes to one of London's airports, when she was pushed to the ground by police.

The women were arrested at 1:54 p.m., British Transport Police said. The police were searching a number of suspect packages in the station.

During the earlier raids, police were involved in a standoff with at least one man in an apartment, pointing assault weapons and pistols at the home, a witness said. Police wearing black balaclavas and body armor surrounded the building.

Sky News broadcast images of police surrounding a red-brick apartment block as they shouted instructions to a suspect inside. Authorities screamed to a man named "Mohammed" to take off his clothes and exit the building, according to a witness identified by Sky News as Lisa Davis.

Police went door to door in the chic neighborhood, famous for its weekend street market, and told people to evacuate.

"I heard six loud bangs, which I found out from a policeman were stun grenades I believe, and then I heard two shots," witness Patrick Ball said. "The noise that I heard was an extremely loud bang."

The area is near west London's Little Wormwood Scrubs park, where police on Saturday found a dark backpack containing a fifth bomb connected to the July 21 attack.

Two small explosions in the area could be heard on video broadcast by Sky News. Helicopters buzzed overhead and police cordoned off a number of streets, and said one person had been arrested. A witness told CNN she saw several people being taken into custody.

Meanwhile, a police watchdog group investigated the killing of a Brazilian electrician by police, who believed he was a suicide bomber.

Investigators from the Independent Police Complaints Commission appealed for witnesses who were at Stockwell subway station in south London on July 22, when Jean Charles de Menezes, 27, was shot eight times - including seven times to the head.

Menezes' funeral is being held Friday in Gonzaga, Brazil, where he was born. Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, leader of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales, will attend a Mass for Menezes at Westminster Cathedral in central London Friday evening.

One of the Tube stations closed after the July 7 attacks reopened Friday. Several bouquets of flowers lay at the entrance to the Edgware Road station in a tribute to the seven people killed there. But passenger numbers were visibly down - a sign of nervousness among Londoners despite a huge police operation to catch the terrorists.

"I felt a bit nervous coming through the tunnel just then and this morning my mum gave me a look as though she was never going to see me again," commuter Jasmine Chandhoke, 22, said. "Everyone was being incredibly vigilant on the train, checking each other's bags."

Scotland Yard police headquarters declined to comment on the arrest in Zambia of a British man sought in connection with the July 7 bombings.

British investigators reportedly believe Haroon Rashid Aswat, 31, had been in telephone contact with some of the four suicide attackers who carried out the July 7 attacks. Aswat told investigators he once was a personal guard for Osama bin Laden, Zambian security officials said on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak publicly.

The British Foreign Office said it was seeking access to a Briton reportedly detained in Zambia but would not identify him.

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Associated Press reporter Lewis Mwanangombe in Lusaka, Zambia, contributed to this report.