Six Men Held Over Terrorist Plot During Pope's U.K. Visit Freed b

“Six men who were arrested under the Terrorism Act 2000 on Friday, Sept. 17, were all released without charge late on Saturday night and early this morning (Sunday),” Scotland Yard said in a statement.

Five of the men were street cleaners who worked for Veolia Environmental Services, one of the contractors for Westminster City Council in the London district the pope visited.

Police said on Sept. 17 that five men between the ages of 26 and 50 were questioned at a central London police station. Initial searches at a business in the city center yielded no weapons or explosives, they said.

The sixth man was arrested at a residential property and a further eight homes in north and east London and two business premises in central London were being searched.

Almost five centuries after King Henry VIII split from Rome, the first papal visit to the U.K. in 28 years was met by protests against child-abuse by clergy. The pope’s opposition to abortion, birth control and same-sex unions in a country where they are legal has also fostered animosity among critics who say he should never have come.

The pope yesterday expressed “deep sorrow” for the “unspeakable crimes” of child abuse within the Catholic Church before meeting and praying with a group of victims.