Body scanners are to be introduced at Heathrow airport in about three weeks, Home Secretary Alan Johnson said.

He also told the House of Commons that all UK airports must have new "explosion trace detection equipment" by the end of the year.

His comments follow an attempt to blow up a US airliner on Christmas Day.

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab is accused of trying to detonate a bomb on a plane from Amsterdam when it was about to land in Detroit.

Gordon Brown has ordered a review of security at UK airports.

Mr Johnson said that BAA had already begun training its staff in behavioural analysis techniques, which would be used to identify individuals that required closer inspection.

The government is also examining whether "additional targeted passenger profiling" could help enhance airport security, he added.

"Since the Detroit incident, working closely with our American colleagues our intelligence agencies have built up a fuller picture of the suspect"


"We will be considering all the issues involved, mindful of civil liberties concerns, aware that identity based-profiling has its limitations, but conscious of our overriding obligations to protect people's life and liberty," he said.

It was revealed on Monday of last week that intelligence about Mr Abdulmutallab had been handed to the US prior to his attempted attack.
BBC News - UK airports to introduce new bomb detection equipment