London Bombing ringleader, Haroon Rashid Aswat – double agent for MI6?

The New Criminologist
Published on 23 August 2005
Author BERRY-DEE, Christopher

In a lengthy statement that will send shockwaves around the world, John Loftus, a terrorism expert and a former prosecutor for the US Justice Department, has publically revealed that the so called mastermind of the 7/7 London Bombings, Haroon Rashid Aswat, is a British ‘Intelligence Asset’.

A TNC US-based source has sent us extraordinary fully verifiable information, along with a filmed interview during which Loftus makes his accusations.

We are double-checking with our contact – a former long-time colleague of former FBI Counter Terrorism Special Agent and Al-Qaeda hunter, John O’Neill, who died in the 9/11 Twin Towers disaster.



Abu Hamza and Haroon Aswat in London cab

Former Justice Dept. prosecutor and terror expert, John Loftus, revealed that the so-called Al-Muhajiroun group, based in London had formed during the Kosovo crisis, during which Fundamentalist Muslim Leaders (Or what is now referred to as Al Qaeda) were recruited by MI6 to fight in Kosovo.

Loftus stated that "...back in the late 1990s, the leaders all worked for British intelligence in Kosovo. Believe it or not, British intelligence actually hired some Al-Qaeda guys to help defend the Muslim rights in Albania and in Kosovo. That's when Al-Muhajiroun got started."

In a blistering attack on MI6 John Loftus went on to spell out that British Intelligence and the US Dept of Justice had protected Haroon Rashid Aswat:

"Back in 1999 he came to America. The Justice Department wanted to indict him in Seattle because him and his buddy were trying to set up a terrorist training school in Oregon... we've just learned that the headquarters of the US Justice Department ordered the Seattle prosecutors not to touch Aswat... apparently Aswat was working for British intelligence."

This story has been around for some weeks, the TNC reports, but it has always been ‘dressed up’ as a slight ‘difference of opinion’ between the FBI and MI6, with the Home Office claiming that they have been reluctant to hand Aswat over to the US authorities because he is a British national.

But, senior US intelligence officials are said to be fuming, claiming that everytime they got close to detaining Aswat, wherever he is in the world, he slips through the net.

Loftus claims in an unprecedented attack on MI6 that this is startling and again highlights how Al Qaeda exists as an organized body only where the intelligence services have created, funded and employed it. Loftus points out that several weeks before the London Bombings, Aswat was again located by the South African Intel agency but was again allowed to slip away, this time to London:

"He was a British intelligence plant. So all of a sudden he disappears. He's in South Africa. We think he's dead; we don't know he's down there. Last month the South African Secret Service come across the guy. He's alive...the Brits know that the CIA wants to get a hold of Haroon. So what happens? He takes off again, goes right to London. He isn't arrested when he lands, he isn't arrested when he leaves... He's on the watch list. The only reason he could get away with that was if he was working for British intelligence. He was a wanted man."

Loftus' information is also backed up by the New York Times and CNN who reported on this incident, however, the internet link to the London Independent’s article has mysteriously disappeared.

If proven, the ramifications of John Loftus’s claims – and he is supported by many FBI agents – could be that the London bombings could have been prevented if Haroon Aswat had been taken into custody long ago.

TNC’s US source writes:

“It is now believed that British born Haroon Rashid Aswat was the brains behind the London attacks on July 7th in which 56 died and 700 were wounded. During the investigation of the London attacks the British police and American intelligence sources were able to determine that Aswat had received on his portable telephone a score of calls from the four suspects in the July 7th London attacks. The Times asserts that Aswat stated that he had been a bodyguard of Osama Bin Laden. This would have made him the 2nd highest- ranking Al Qaeda member in Britain. Haroon Rashid Aswat was an aide to the cleric, Abu Hamza Al-Masri. Abu Hamza was listed by USA intelligence sources as a suspected terrorist financier because of links to the Islamic Army of Aden, an Al Qaeda-associated group and the 2000 attack on the U.S. warship the USS Cole in Yemen. For 10 years Aswat had associated with militant Muslim groups and had been to Khalden, the Al-Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan. Haroon Rashid Aswat is also known to have ties to South Africa and Johannesburg and suspected of involvement in planning the attack on the USS Cole in Yemen.

“Aswat had long been the object of US and British intelligence surveillance. Haroon Aswat had entered to Zambia on July 6, 2005. He was arrested on July 20, 2005 in Lusaka for "terrorist activities" and "infringements with the rules of immigration".

Loftus added:

“This is the guy [Aswat], and what's really embarrassing is that the entire British police are out chasing him, and one wing of the British government, MI6 or the British Secret Service, has been hiding him. And this has been a real source of contention between the CIA, the Justice Department, and Britain…he is a double agent.

The CIA and the Israelis all accused MI6 of letting all these terrorists live in London not because they're getting Al-Qaeda information, but for appeasement. It was one of those you leave us alone, we leave you alone kind of things.”