Subway riders in the nation's capital were greeted this morning with a chilling warning that authorities will randomly search backpacks and suitcases as part of stepped-up holiday anti-terror precautions announced by federal authorities.
"The program is part of the continuously changing law enforcement programs designed to keep the system safe. Metro Transit Police conducted the inspections in conjunction with Transportation Security Administration officials," the District of Colombia-based Metrorail said in an statement.
The random inspections, believed to be the first since immediately after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, began at subway stops in the Maryland and Virginia suburbs, including at the College Park Station near the University of Maryland, authorities confirmed.
At the White House, counterterrorism czar John Brennan said Americans should be vigilant over the holidays and threats should be taken seriously.
"We remain vigilant to attempts by Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations to carry out cowardly attacks against innocent men, women and children. And we are working very closely with other governments to share all threat information immediately and to coordinate closely our counterterrorism and security activities," Brennan said.
Senior officials from federal departments and agencies met Tuesday at the White House "to review the latest threat reporting, and to coordinate security and counterterrorism plans that will be in place during the holiday season," Brennan added.
The heightened security comes after Afghani-born Awais Younis, 25, of Arlington, Va., was arrested this month after making threats on his Facebook page, where he had a photograph showing him armed with an AK-47.
Pakistani-born Farooque Ahmed, 34, of Ashburn, Va., was arrested in October on charges of plotting to bomb the D.C. Metro system. Ahmed allegedly planned the attacks with a group of co-conspirators who turned out to be undercover FBI agents.
Long-held fears of an attack around the holiday season were realized last year when Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, known as “the Christmas bomber,” tried to set off explosives in his underwear on a Northwest Airlines flight bound from Amsterdam to Detroit on Christmas Day.
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