Police appeal for bomb scene images

British police today issued an urgent appeal to the public for any photographs, video footage or mobile phone images taken in…

British police today issued an urgent appeal to the public for any photographs, video footage or mobile phone images taken in the aftermath of the London bombings.

Deputy Assistant Commissioner Brian Paddick said: "We believe these images may contain vital information to assist us in the investigation."

He urged anyone with pictures from the scenes of the attacks to e-mail the images to Scotland Yard at: imagesatmet.police.uk. Mr Paddick said it was important people also supplied their name and contact number. He said all information would be dealt with in the strictest confidence.

Peter Clarke, head of Scotland Yard anti-terrorist branch, added: "This was a callous and cowardly attack on members of the public.

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"These images may contain crucial information which may help detectives in this complex and painstaking inquiry."

Police said there were now 49 bodies at the temporary mortuary which has been established at an undisclosed military site. All visible bodies have now been recovered from the wreckage of the tube train between Russell Square and King's Cross and there are no other bodies left at the other blast site.

However, at Russell Square emergency workers are continuing to search to see if any remains are hidden underneath the carriages of the train. Police liaison officers have been sent to 59 families who fear their loved ones are either dead or critically injured.

At a 24 hour assistance centre relatives in central London, 31 families have now reported their loved ones missing.

Mr Paddick rejected criticisms that identification of victims seemed to be taking some time and said:  “The coroner has not formally indicated the identity of any victims.”

He said if victims were in possession of obvious identity documents, relatives were being contacted. He also denied that the reason victims were not being publicly named was because police believed one or more of the bombers may be among them.

Police also revealed that there had been several cases of racial and religiously-motivated offences since Thursday's blasts.

Mr Paddick said: “We have had some incidents of hate crime; racially and religiously-motivated offences, and we take those kinds of offences very seriously; but thankfully none of these have been the cause of major damage, although there was a serious injury reported in one of those incidents.”

PA