Met officers redeployed from G8

Last updated at 15:15 07 July 2005


Metropolitan Police officers in Scotland for the G8 summit are to be urgently redeployed to London following today's terror attacks on the capital.

The officer in charge of G8 policing during this week's gathering of world leaders at Gleneagles said many of the 1,500 Met officers north of the border would be sent back south.

Chief Constable Peter Wilson, of Fife Constabulary, said: "The support and professionalism of our colleagues from England and Wales have been a major factor in the successful policing of this summit.

"The absolute priority for us is to make sure we now meet their needs and re-deploy officers as quickly as possible in order to deal with this crisis," added Mr Wilson, who is also head of the Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland.

The attacks took place on the day that G8 world leaders held their first full day of talks in Perthshire.

Mr Wilson said it was likely the 1,500 officers in Scotland from the Met - which has a force of 30,000 officers - would be going back to London.

A special force of 12,000 officers has been created from across Scotland, England and Wales to police the G8 north of the border.

Mr Wilson insisted he would still have more than enough manpower to cope with any trouble from anti-capitalist protesters.

"Many of those officers would anyway have been returning to their own forces over the next 24 hours," he said.

"We are currently searching our databases to identify which officers, particularly those with forensic and evidence gathering skills, can best respond to those needs.

"And I would like to send a strong message to those in this country who have demonstrated deplorable behaviour in the last few days, that they will be continue to be dealt with swiftly and robustly."

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