The new anti-terror plans were agreed only after days of argument over how to prevent terror attacks being planned or executed in Germany while protecting civil liberties.

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There are a lot of people in Washington these days claiming to be on the front lines of the war on terror.

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Public and political outrage in Britain was immediate and intense, and it only got worse over the next two days as it emerged that victims of a terror bombing and the families of British troops who had died in action had also been possible targets.

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Last week FBI Assistant Director John Miller said that most of the 2, 176 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act search warrants approved in 2006 were used against terror suspects inside the US. Three days later, the FBI announced the arrest of the members of an American and Caribbean terror cell that was plotting to bomb JFK International Airport.

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But all the fanfare associated with the value of biodiversity, the excitement of discovering new species, expanding or at least maintaining parklands, greenbelts, and critical biological corridors has in a matter of a few days once again been tainted by doubts and no small terror.

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The senior administration officials disclosed that on January 1, just days after the attempted terror attack, two FBI agents secretly flew to Lagos, Nigeria, to meet with officials of the CIA and the State Department.

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