Counter-terrorism officials arrested 16 people in separate raids in Britain on suspicion of preparing terrorist acts, less than a month after an alleged plot to blow up US-bound passenger jets from UK was foiled, police said on Saturday.
While 14 arrests were made from east and south London in overnight raids, two men were nabbed in an unrelated operation on Saturday in Manchester.
But Scotland Yard said the arrests were linked neither to the foiled airliner plot, revealed on August 10, nor the July 7, 2005 London underground bombings that left 56 dead. Armed police took 14 men into custody from south and east London on suspicion of 'the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism,' Scotland Yard said.
They were arrested by officers from the Metropolitan Police's Anti- Terrorist Branch under the Terrorism Act 2000 'in a pre- planned, intelligence-led operation,' a Scotland Yard spokesman said.
"The arrests in south and east London follow many months of surveillance and investigation in a joint operation involving the Anti-Terrorist Branch, Special Branch and the Security Services,' he added.
Two others were arrested under the Terrorism Act 2000 in Manchester at 6:00 am (1030 IST). But Police said the arrests in London and Manchester were not connected. Twelve of the arrests in the capital were made in a Chinese restaurant in the Borough area of south London, where upto 40 policemen in riot gear entered the packed premises.
The suspects are in custody at a central London police station, A Metropolitan Police spokesman said.
The raids came after months of surveillance into those suspected of recruiting or encouraging others to take part in terrorist activities, BBC said in a report, adding the arrests were linked to allegations of terror training camps within UK.
An Islamic school in East Sussex for boys aged between 11 and 16 was also searched as part of the same operation. The owner of Chinese restaurant 'Bridge to China Town' in Borough Road said he was surprised by last night's raid.
"It was surprising actually, because plenty of (police officers) suddenly came in all together...They suddenly came inside because they were suspicious of some of the customers and they talked to them (for) more than one hour, two hours. And they arrested some of them," he told BBC.
The restaurant was full of people, including children, and diners were told they were being questioned under the Terrorism Act. Each was asked their name and address, after which those arrested were taken away in handcuffs, witnesses said.
A spokesman for Greater Manchester Police said the arrest of two people in Manchester followed an operation that took place on 23 August, when one man was held and a house in Elmfield Street in Cheetham Hill was searched.
Three addresses in the Cheetham Hill area were being searched, he said.
The arrests came even as the investigation into the foiled airline plot was continuing. Out of the 25 people arrested last month, five have been released without charge and 15 have been charged, 11 of them with conspiracy to murder and preparing acts of terrorism.
Police were granted another week to question the remaining five people still in custody, who have not yet been charged.
