US intelligence agencies – the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) and the FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation), have established a ‘threat integration centre’ in association with security agencies of the UK to make the London 2012 Olympics ‘safe and secure’.

This was announced by the National Counterterrorism Centre. “For the past two years, NCTC, in coordination with our intelligence community and British partners, has been leading the US effort to make sure that we are collecting and analysing and sharing all potential threat information relating to the Olympics and that we are in a position to respond quickly to prevent any possible plotting tied to the games,” Matthew Olsen, Director of the NCTC has said.

“In particular, NCTC, with our intelligence community partners, established a threat integration centre, designed to operate around the clock providing real-time situational awareness and threat analysis,” Olsen said.

The threat analysis centre is staffed by officials from the CIA, NCTC and the FBI as well as other US intelligence services to review threat information and quickly share it with British Security officials from Scotland Yard, MI-5 and MI-6.

According to officials, the threat integration centre, which is housed at the US Embassy in London is fully operational. “We are, as part of our routine and ongoing and longstanding coordination with our close ally, we’ll have some liaison personnel that will be in country during the Olympic Games. They won’t directly be providing security. That’s what the UK authorities will be doing. But they’ll be providing some routine liaison capability,” Patrick Ventrell said at a US State Department briefing.