Brit cops' "Ring of Steel" around Labor Party Conference id QAA21239; Wed, 1 Oct 1997 16:24:01 -0400 Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit source: mnovick@laedu.lalc.k12.ca.us Wed Oct 1 00:26:14 1997 England: Armed cops create "ring of steel" around Labor Party Conference Times of London 9/30/97 AN UNPRECEDENTED security operation has taken effect in Brighton. Armed police surrounded the conference centre and main hotels with metal barriers and wire fences drilled into the ground, creating a "secure area". Thousands of delegates, including Cabinet ministers, had to pass through security checks yesterday before they were admitted to the conference. Only four senior members of the Cabinet who are guarded round the clock by armed police escaped the checks. Some of Labour's grandest names had to queue alongside ordinary delegates who had travelled to Brighton from all over Britain. Neil Kinnock, the former Labour leader and now a European commissioner, had to raise his arms as a metal detector was run round his body when he arrived just before lunch. A smart golden fountain pen in his jacket pocket triggered a buzzer in the device. Security has always been tight at the conference of the governing party after IRA terrorists murdered five people at the 1984 Tory conference in Brighton when a huge bomb ripped through the Grand Hotel. But this week's operation dwarfed the security at last year's Tory conference in Bournemouth. Labour has opted for a different type of operation from that undertaken for the Conservatives when they were in government. At the Tory conference last year, there was less security outside the conference centre and hotels, which meant that delegates had to be searched every time they entered one of the main buildings. In Brighton, delegates are searched once before the enter the secure area, which means they do not have to be searched as they enter the conference centre or the Grand and Metropole hotels. Every delegate, visitor, journalist and hotel worker has to display a pass with their photograph before they can enter the secure area. To reach the main entrance next to the conference centre on the seafront, delegates have to walk down to the beach and cross back under the road through a tunnel. Group 4 security officers check people's passes three times before they pass through airport-style X-ray machines. Even food for the secure area is X-rayed. Another reason for the tight security is that the logistics of the conference were worked out well before the IRA called its ceasefire in July. (Copyright 1997 Times of London In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. Be PART of the solution -- People Against Racist Terror/ PO Box 1055/Culver City CA 90232-1055/310-288-5003/ Order our journal "Turning the Tide." mnovickttt@igc.org Free Mumia Abu Jamal! Free All POW's and Political Prisoners! Abolish the Racist Death Penalty! ================================================================= NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org e-mail: nyt@blythe.org ================================================================= nytire-10.01.97-16:24:17-26243