British Prime Minister Tony Blair has called a summit with British Muslim leaders and has vowed to uproot the "evil ideology" and "twisted teachings" which inspire suicide bombers around the world.
Mr Blair's promise came as many more details emerged of the four British suicide bombers who have been identified as travelling from Leeds to carry out the attacks on London that left more than 50 people dead and hundreds injured.
Police and other emergency workers were preparing to move the wreckage of the tube train under London's King's Cross station last night. It is understood that detailed examination of the crime site has provided clues to the identity of a fifth man who police believe was connected to the attack on London's transport network but was not one of the bombers. It was also reported that mobile phone records in Leeds had linked one of the four suspected suicide bombers to the man who is believed to have been involved in a previous attack thwarted by the security services.
Meanwhile, in Brussels, EU interior ministers agreed a new package of counter terrorist measures which include the compulsory storage of phone and internet records. At the meeting, British Home Secretary Charles Clarke robustly denied telling his French counterpart Nicolas Sarkozy that police had previously had some of the London suspects under arrest.
Mr Clarke said he was not aware of such a suggestion, while police were comprehensively investigating the background of all four suspects in the search for evidence about their associates and support network.
In the House of Commons, Mr Blair signalled his readiness to give police new powers to deal with those inciting or instigating terrorism, and new measures to enable the exclusion or deportation of radical clerics or others entering Britain to incite hatred.
Confirming his own "shock" at the discovery that the bombers were British nationals of Pakistani origin and speaking against a backdrop of some 100 race or faith hate incidents, Mr Blair told MPs: "This is a small group of extremists. Not one that can be ignored, because of the danger they pose. But neither should it define Muslims in Britain who are overwhelmingly law-abiding decent members of our society."
Britain will fall silent at midday as the whole of Europe observes a two-minute silence in honour of the victims of last Thursday's bombings. Lloyds of London will ring its Lutine bell in remembrance as it did after the September 11th attacks on the United States in 2001, while trains and buses grind to a halt and workers leave their desks and take to the streets in a show of solidarity.
And again tonight, thousands are expected to pack Trafalgar Square for a vigil to remember the dead and also pay tribute to the members of London's transport and emergency services.
With an international manhunt now focused on the search for the "mastermind" behind the bombers, Mayor Ken Livingstone said London would today "remember all those who died last Thursday and show its defiance of those who try to change the character of our city through terror."
Meanwhile the uncle of one of the suspected suicide bombers, Bashir Ahmed (65) said the family of Shahzad Tanweer, who recently studied religion in Pakistan, could not accept he was capable of the bombings. "It wasn't him, it must have been forces behind him," he said.