Anti-terror rules eased for Harry Potter author

Airport anti-terror rules were eased to allow Harry Potter author JK Rowling to take her precious manuscript, the final instalment in the boy wizard saga, onto a flight leaving New York.

Millionaire author Rowling refused to be parted from her work and pleaded with airport staff to allow her to keep possession of the valuable manuscript for fears it would be lost or stolen from the baggage hold.

Following her pleas, airport security allowed the publicity-shy author to carry it on board, after she had bound it with elastic bands.

Baggage restrictions were introduced for passengers flying from the States following the uncovering of an alleged plot to blow up transatlantic flights between the country and Britain.

The saga unfolded as Rowling was returning from New York where she took part in a charity book reading with fellow scribes Stephen King and John Irving.

She wrote to fans on her website: "I refused to be parted from the manuscript of book seven.

"A large part of it is handwritten and there was no copy of anything I had done while in the US."

Rowling went on: "They let me take it on thankfully, bound up in elastic bands. I don't know what I would have done if they hadn't - sailed home probably."

Rowling, who lives in Edinburgh with her husband and two children, 11-year-old daughter Jessica has already written the final chapter of the final Harry Potter book but has sparked frenzied speculation after admitting two major characters are killed off.

She has also admitted she was tempted to kill off Harry so no-one else could write stories about him.

She said: "I've never been tempted to kill him off before the end of book seven. I've always planned seven books and that's where I want to finish, that's where I want to go.

"I can complete understand the mentality of an author that thinks 'I'm going to kill them off because there can be no non-author written sequels. So it will end with me, after I'm dead and gone they can't bring back the characters."

The 41-year-old writer is planning a fairy-tale book for younger children but ruled out ever writing an eighth Harry Potter.