Police on 'red alert' for terror threats during New Year's Day parade
POLICE are on red alert for the world’s biggest New Year’s Day parade with marksmen and huge steel barriers in place in London today.
Undercover special forces will be on duty at the London parade to combat terror threats
Undercover special forces and thousands of officers, including firearms teams, will be on duty at the event, with half a million spectators in the capital.
Metal jaws will stop a terrorist driving a lorry into the crowds as at last month’s Christmas market in Berlin and during Bastille Day festivities in Nice in July.
There is heightened security across Europe after Islamic State called on “lone wolves” to attack New Year celebrations.
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IS posted: “Their celebrations, gatherings, clubs, markets, theatres, cinemas, malls and even their hospitals are all perfect targets for you.”
It added that jihadists would “replace their fireworks with explosive belts and devices, and turn their singing and clapping into weeping and wailing”.
The parade, to be broadcast worldwide, will see American high school marching bands and cheerleaders join Pearly Kings and Queens and giant inflatables from Green Park to Westminster.
Metal jaws will be deployed to prevent lorry attacks as happened in Nice and Berlin last year
Last night’s fireworks in London were policed by 3,000 officers, including armed police on the tube network for the first time.
A similar number will be on duty this afternoon. Scotland Yard requested extra security after the Berlin attack, when Tunisian Anis Amri killed 12 and injured 56 with a lorry on the city’s Breitscheidplatz.
A parade spokesman said: “We are in contact with the relevant authorities and enact anything that they feel necessary. They requested additional measures which have been put in to place.”
3000 police were present at last night's new year fireworks
The 2.2-mile, three-hour route starts by the Ritz Hotel and winds through Piccadilly and Pall Mall around Trafalgar Square and down Whitehall – passing Downing Street – to Parliament Square.
More than 8,000 performers will take part and spectators who have paid to watch from one of three grandstands face bag checks before taking their seats.
Det Supt Phil Langworthy said there are overt and covert measures in place.