Alastair Jamieson / msnbc.com

Jim L., left, and other members of the Occupy Mile End protest group at their camp in east London on Thursday.

LONDON -- An eviction notice has been served on dozens of Occupy protesters who have set up camp in a park next to Team USA's Olympic track and field training base.

About 50 demonstrators are occupying Mile End Park – two miles from the main London 2012 site and next door to a sports stadium where American athletes will prepare for events in July.

The park is also visible from the priority traffic lanes that will be used to whisk VIPs and other participants from central London to the Olympic Village, which is located to the east of the U.K. capital.

The protesters say they are part of the anti-capitalist Occupy movement, which has seen sit-ins and clashes with police in cities including New York, Seattle, Washington, D.C., and Oakland.

An Occupy London camp was forcibly removed from the grounds of St Paul's Cathedral by police at the end of February, resulting in 20 arrests.

Local authorities have now secured a court order to close down Occupy Mile End, which began five weeks ago and includes about a dozen tents, a campfire and makeshift toilet facilities.

Police evict Occupy London protesters from camp

Tower Hamlets Borough Council applied for the order following complaints from local residents. The manager of a nearby nature reserve also accused camp members of damaging important trees by taking branches for firewood, according to a report in the East London Advertiser newspaper.

One of the protesters, who gave his name as Jim L., told msnbc.com the group had agreed to leave the site voluntarily on Sunday.

"This is one of Britain's poorest boroughs and we don't want to take council resources away from things like schools and hospitals so we have agreed to vacate the site without costing the council a penny," he said.

Mark Taylor, spokesman for the Mile End Residents' Association, said locals were "looking forward" to a "constructive and companionable relationship with Team USA."

He said: "We are very pleased that the council has secured a possession order to reclaim the park for its intended purpose. It's very sad that trees had to be pulled down for firewood and children's activities disrupted before the council acted."

Slideshow: When the Olympics is your neighbor

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A diverse community in East London will welcome the world to Britain for the 2012 Olympic Games. Meet residents and hear how they feel about having a huge, world stage in their backyard.

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Council officials insisted that nobody from the United States Olympic Committee, Team USA or the London 2012 organizers had expressed concern about the Occupy protest on their doorstep.

A spokesman for the council told msnbc.com: "The USA track and field team will be training at Mile End Stadium during the Olympic Games. They have funded extensive improvements to the stadium, and will be providing a variety of community benefits including free coaching sessions and opportunities to watch the team training.

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"We are working with the United States Olympic Committee (USOC) on security issues, understandably these issues are sensitive and therefore we are not able to comment in detail, but we do not anticipate that these will impact on the local community."

The council said it would go to the High Court to have the protesters moved if they did not leave the site, which is owned by a private trust on behalf of the council for use as a public park.

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Jim L. said the Occupy camp would move to a new, unidentified, site on Sunday. He added that there was little chance of protests targeting the Olympic Games.

"It would be impossible because of the security, in my own view," he said. "We're not against the Olympics as everybody likes a bit of sport, but I believe it is just one big advertising event for the benefit of corporate sponsors."

At London Olympics, dogs have sniffed out a key anti-terror role

He said the camp location had been chosen to highlight the issue of poverty in Tower Hamlets and not because of the proximity to Team USA's stadium.

Slideshow: Venues for 2012 London Olympic Games

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From Wimbledon to Wembley Stadium to The Dome, a look at the venues for the 2012 London Olympic Games.

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"There are huge problems here -- lack of affordable housing, unemployment and poverty," he said. "This is not so much a protest as a process, which is why we've come here – to listen to people and gather support. There isn’t much point in trying to occupy private land in order to disrupt the institutions of capitalism.”

American competitors at the Games will have several bases across London for different sports. Other sites include the University of East London campuses in Docklands and Stratford.

Langdon School, in the nearby Poplar area, will be home to the Canadian Olympic team.

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Paul Hackett / Reuters

Spectators find their seats at the official opening of the London Olympics stadium, inside the Olympic park, London, Saturday.

Britain has begun an inquiry into security at the London Olympics after a worker reportedly smuggled a fake bomb onto the site to expose flaws in its anti-terror defenses.

The worker carried the artificial bomb through two checkpoints without being searched by security staff, according to a British tabloid newspaper report.

Once inside, he was able to drive the package through the site, taking it past the velodrome before posing for a photograph with it outside the Olympic Stadium, The Sun reported.

The stunt, 24 hours before 40,000 people attended the official opening of the stadium on Saturday, was designed to show how vulnerable the site, which also includes the athletes' village, could be to a terrorist attack.

Fears that the international spectacle could be targeted by extremists have led organisers to spend $1.6 billion (£1 billion) on security for the games including 23,700 guards, 14,000 troops at key times and an 11-mile electric fence.

A spokesman for Britain’s Home Office told The Telegraph it had asked games organizers to "look into this incident and report back to the Home Secretary urgently".

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LONDON -- Benson’s tail wagged lazily as he weaved through the crowds in London’s St. Pancras railway station.

“Good morning ladies and gents, police dog working,” said the pooch’s handler, Graham Rowlstone of the British Transport Police, as the pair strode beneath a soaring glass-and-blue-steel ceiling. “Just making sure it’s nice and safe for you.”

Some travelers and commuters smiled, laughed and said hello to the black lab. A few petted him. But mostly the pair slipped easily through the concourse.

Suddenly, Benson cocked his ears, lifted his tail and picked up the pace. He trotted in front of a nondescript man in a dark blue fleece, sat down and looked up expectantly.

“Good morning, sir. Where are you traveling today?” Rowlstone asked.

It was a drill to show that Benson’s explosives-sniffing skills were still sharp. The dog passed the test and the man in blue – dog trainer and police officer Paul Saunders – dropped a tennis ball, which Benson chewed enthusiastically.

Dealing with threats
As Britain gears up for the estimated one million visitors expected to descend on the city for the 2012 Olympic Games, bomb-sniffing teams like Benson and Rowlstone are preparing to deal with the threats that come with the big crowds.

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Benson is a relative newcomer to the explosives-detection space, which has been long dominated by “proactive” dogs, which concentrate on inspecting places such as lost-luggage departments and suspicious packages left on trains and buses. In other words, they deal with stationary targets. 

About three years ago, the British Transport Police and others began to train so-called passive dogs like Benson, which search for explosives among crowds of people, essentially following a scent until it stops.

NBC News

Officer Graham Rowlstone of the British Transport Police pats Benson after he correctly identifies a threat in London's St. Pancras Station.

Bomb-sniffer dogs are an integral part of the system in place meant to keep travelers safe and public transport running smoothly, British Transport Police Inspector Ed Purchase told msnbc.com.

“The dogs are an extended part of the security operation within London and around the country, making sure the railways are safe, members of the public are safe and that we can keep all the transport system open,” he said.

With the biggest and oldest dog unit in the country, the British Transport Police – in charge of policing Britain's railways and subways – know what they’re talking about.

Attack highly likely?
Britain has faced threats to its mass transit systems for well over a century – the first terrorist strike on London’s underground network was in the 1880s.

And just a day after the announcement was made to award the Olympics to London on July 6, 2005, the city suffered its worst peacetime attack when four suicide bombers killed 52 commuters.

Al-Qaida to Occupy: UK preps Olympics security

So it comes as no surprise that the issue of security on the country’s transport system weighs heavily on the minds of the Olympics organizers.

The games will see the U.K.’s largest peacetime security operation involving tens of thousands of security officials, with 13,500 military personnel, 12,000 police and 10,000 private contractors.

Current potential dangers to London come from a variety of sources including al-Qaida and related jihadi groups, right-wing extremists and Northern Ireland-related militants, according to officials.

The U.K.’s alert level is expected to be raised to “severe” during the games, meaning that an attack is considered highly likely, the government says.

Four-legged ambassadors
For Benson and his canine colleagues it will be a busy time. But while they are most valued for their keen noses, the dogs also have a key public relations role to play.

“(The dogs) are a tool … effective across a range of activities – reassurance, engagement with the public and detection – that’s why they’re attractive to us,” Superintendent Philip Trendall, of the British Transport Police's Counter Terrorism Support Unit, told msnbc.com.

“People notice us a lot more,” said Constable Tony Mart, who works with another black lab, named Pete. “They will always see a police officer with a dog. The interaction with the public is great,” he said.

British Transport Police

Benson the police dog even has his own business card.

About a dozen passives have been incorporated into the team over the last three years, Trendall said, but declined to discuss their success rates.

And he says that the dogs’ public-facing role in boosting confidence and good cheer is almost as important as its explosives-sniffing one.

“A machine that people want to come up and give a biscuit to and pat doesn’t exist,” he said.

F. Brinley Bruton is a reporter and editor with msnbc.com in London. Follow her on Twitter.

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