A British Anglican priest working in Baghdad says he received a mysterious warning from an alleged al Qaeda member, months before last week's failed bomb plots in London and Glasgow.
Canon Andrew White, who regularly speaks with extremists in an effort to lower sectarian violence, said he met with an educated Iraqi man-- along with Sunni Muslim tribal and religious leaders -- in Amman, Jordan on April 18.
The other leaders said the unnamed man was with al Qaeda. The man, who had travelled from Syria, warned of attacks in the West.
"It was like meeting the devil," White told The Associated Press by phone on Wednesday. "He talked of destroying Britain and the United States."
And then, White recalled, the man gave him a cryptic message: "'Those who cure you are going to kill you'."
While White passed on the general threat to the British Foreign Office, he didn't tell them about the medical angle, he said.
The Foreign Office said they have no record of such a warning.
All of the eight suspects arrested in the failed bomb attacks were employed by Britain's National Health Service. They include doctors and other medical professionals. Some had worked at hospitals in England and Scotland.
One angle British authorities are investigating is whether the plan was hatched on British soil or abroad.
Dr. Bilal Abdulla, one of the suspects, was born in Britain, but grew up in Iraq and trained there as a doctor. He returned to Britain in 2004.
British counterterrorism officials say, however, that they are investigating links with a number of different countries.
Threat level dropped
On Wednesday, Britain lowered its national security threat level from "critical" to "severe" following the arrests.
The drop means officials believe further attacks are considered likely instead of imminent.
Home Secretary Jacqui Smith said in a statement that the reduction "does not mean the overall threat has gone away."
"There remains a serious and real threat against the United Kingdom and I would again ask that the public remain vigilant," she said.
Officials believe they have apprehended all of the main suspects involved in the plots -- two failed car bombings in London last Friday, and another botched attack on Glasgow Airport Saturday, in which two men tried to drive a flaming SUV into a terminal.
Abdulla was in the flaming SUV.
Police allege that both Abdulla and Khalil Ahmed, the alleged driver of the SUV, also planted and tried to detonate the London car bombs.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has responded by ordering a review of the recruitment of foreign health service staff.
"I have asked ... the new terrorism minister to conduct an immediate review as to what arrangements we must make in relation to recruitment to the NHS (National Health Service)," Brown told parliament on Wednesday.
In Britain, about 80,000 doctors are foreign-born and trained. About 400 Iraqi doctors are working there.
"We have thousands of Asian doctors, most of them Muslims who've been working here since the 1970s. they have literally saved the British health care system," said Bashir Mann of the Muslim Council of Great Britain.
Brown also said that he's ordered expanded checks on immigrants taking skilled jobs in Britain.
Reports have emerged that four of the suspects were on intelligence databases used to track radical Islamists. None of them were considered to be a big enough threat to require surveillance by security agents.
Abdulla was one of those. He got noticed for visiting Islamist websites.
Relatives of Abdulla told the Guardian newspaper in Britain that they think he may have fallen under the spell of Sheikh Ahmad al-Qubeisi, a Sunni cleric in Iraq who has glorified martyrdom.
With a report from CTV's Jed Kahane and files from the Associated Press
