London, Jan. 31 (Reuters): British Airways and Air France said today they had cancelled five flights to the US amid fears of a possible September 11-style attack.

A US official said Washington had intelligence that the al Qaida network, which carried out the 2001 hijacked plane attacks, may be targeting five or six US-bound flights from Europe. “There are a handful of flights we are concerned about and British Airways has cancelled about half of them,” the official said on condition of anonymity. “We have received threat reporting that indicates al Qaida’s desire to target these particular flights.”

The cancelled BA flights are BA-223 from London to Washington tomorrow and Monday, and BA-207 to Miami tomorrow.

“We cancelled these flights on advice from the UK government for security reasons,” a spokeswoman for the airline said, without giving details. Air France said it had cancelled two flights from Paris to Washington. “We confirm that for reasons of safety, we have cancelled flight number 026 to Washington on February 1 and the same flight on February 2,” a spokeswoman said.

Intelligence information triggering fears of a new September 11-style attack led to the cancellation of several international flights over the Christmas and New Year period.

BA’s flight 223 to Washington had been the subject of particular concern in early January, when it was cancelled several times because of security fears and then delayed for hours several more times. BA flights to Riyadh in Saudi Arabia and flights to the US from France and Mexico were also grounded.

Today’s cancellations came after Britain warned travellers they faced years of security alerts amid western intelligence fears of plots by al Qaida and other extremist groups. “There’s been a lot of strategic intelligence pointing to an interest in using an aeroplane in an attack,” Kevin Rosser, an analyst with Control Risks Group, said.