By The Associated Press
Last update - 00:06 19/10/2008
Courtesy Of Haaretz
The former head of Britain's security services said in remarks published Saturday that the response to the 9/11 terror attacks in the United States was a huge overreaction.
Stella Rimington, who retired 12 years ago from Britain's domestic security service, MI5, said the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 were not that different from other terrorist attacks.
"You know, it was another terrorist incident. It was huge, and horrible, and seemed worse because we all watched it unfold on television," she is reported as saying in an interview published Saturday by the Guardian.
"I'd lived with terrorist events for a good part of my working life, and this was, as far as I was concerned, another one," she was quoted as saying.
Rimington has become a vocal critic of the British government's anti-terror legislation. She opposed the government's plan to extend the amount of time police can hold terror suspects without charge from 28 to 42 days, a proposal that was defeated in the House of Lords last week.
In the interview, Rimington is also reported to have said said the Iraq war led some young men to take up terrorism.
"If what we're looking at is groups of disaffected young men born in this country who turn to terrorism, then I think to ignore the effect of the war in Iraq is misleading," she is quoted as saying.
Britain's Foreign Office said it had no comment.
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