The latest terror attacks and attempted attacks in the United Kingdom have shown that terrorists can strike anytime and anywhere. Their actions are absolutely indiscriminate.

If one looks at the general view, terrorists have killed thousands of people in the world in just a few years. Of course, the major event that everyone remembers was the 11 September attacks in New York, but there have been many others. The current intensity of attacks perhaps began with the bomb attack on the US embassy in Kenya and was followed up with the attack on the USS Cole while it was docked in Yemen. It is unrelated, but one should remember that the previous port of call for this vessel was Grand Harbour, in Valletta.

The attacks continued with the most devastating one yet – the attack on the twin towers. But we should also remember that there have been attacks in Madrid, Sharm el-Sheik in Egypt, London, Bali and now Glasgow.

What we should also remember is that there have been foiled terror attempts, such as the one where cells planned to poison the water supply of Rome, the foiled attempt to smuggle explosives onto planes and attack Heathrow Airport. There was also an instance where a refugee who passed through Malta ended up on terrorism charges in the UK. What are we getting at? Well the answer is quite simply in the title. Terrorists attack indiscriminately and this brings us to the point in question. Should we assume that we are safe from attacks? The links above mentioned are fact and there is not a single thing we can do about them. If a terrorist decides that he wants to use an aircraft, or a car packed with explosives, or even public transport for an act of terrorism – no one can enter his mind and read his thoughts, it is a decision that has been taken, as simple as that.

But there are other areas where we can be more vigilant. Let us go back to the bombings. Did anyone ever think Bali would be bombed? Or Sharm el-Sheik? The answer to that is no. And who were the targets? Holidaymakers. And this also brings us to the potential havoc that could have been wreaked in the streets of London last week, where cars were found packed with gas cylinders, petrol and masonry nails. If those bombs had gone off, the toll on human life would have been indescribable. Like the rest of the world, we must be vigilant. We know our police and security services do keep an ear to the ground, but we, the public, must remain vigilant. There is no telling who or what could ever be a target for terrorists and we should never for one moment assume that this country is immune from such attacks.

We do realise that this country is very limited in its resources, but we have hosted international events and dealt with them without incident. We should also remember that, like elsewhere in the world, we have high profile embassies that could be a target. As we have said: anywhere is game. But given the limited resources that we have, our focus should really be on intelligence – ask any war general and he will tell you that information is key, it really is the decisive edge in any battle. And that is what we are facing – a battle. We do realise that the authorities do not give out sensitive information and rightly so. Ignorance may be bliss, but do we have a plan of action? Are we in contact with other homeland security agencies? We assume that the answer is yes, but we should never take anything for granted. Time will tell.