Egypt's Interior Ministry has confirmed the arrest of an Egyptian man wanted by British police in connection with last week's London bombings.
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| Hasib Hussain |
Magdy Elnashar, a chemistry student, was detained in Cairo. The Interior Ministry is to issue a statement shortly with further details.
Police investigating last week's attacks in London were seeking an Egyptian-born chemist who studied in the United States and lived in Leeds - but had not been seen since the bombings.
Police say the explosives recovered at a house searched in Leeds were acetone peroxide, an explosive comprised of ingredients widely available in chemist shops.
Anti-terrorism police chief Peter Clarke
Police had earlier said the explosives used in last week's attacks were of a high-grade military type.
However, the discovery in Leeds has raised fears of further attacks as the explosives match those found in the shoes worn by Richard Reid who had tried to bomb a transatlantic flight in 2001.
The confirmed number of dead from last week's bomb attacks on London has reached 54 after the death last night of a man who was injured in the bus bombing.
Police said yesterday that they would need months to uncover the planning and financial network behind the four young men who carried out last week's attacks.
Anti-terrorism police chief Peter Clarke said that, beyond the identity of the attackers, police wanted to know: "Who supported them? Who financed them? Who trained them? Who encouraged them?"
Security analysts have said it is inconceivable the four - the youngest only 18 - could have carried out attacks that required complex planning, careful selection of targets, access to high explosives and a detailed knowledge of bomb-making.
Police officially identified two of the suicide bombers yesterday, Hasib Hussain and Shahzad Tanweer (22), whom they say attacked a subway train between Liverpool Street and Aldgate stations.
Both were Britons of Pakistani ancestry, as was Mohammed Sidique Khan (30). Khan, from Dewsbury, West Yorkshire, is thought to have blown up the Edgware Road train, although no forensic evidence can as yet place him at the scene.
Reports say the fourth attacker was Jamaican-born Briton Lindsey Germaine.
Jamaican Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesman Wilton Dyer said officials were waiting for Britain to confirm the identity of the suspect before they could help in identifying his possible origins in Jamaica.
British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, said finding those who planned the attack "is the absolute focus of the current investigation".