UK bomber did not act alone – cops
Attacker often travelled to Libya
BRITAIN’S top domestic security official said yestrday it was “likely” that the bomber who killed 22 people at a concert on Monday night had help, a day after the nation’s threat level was raised and the military was allowed to be deployed to guard public events.
Home Secretary Amber Rudd did not provide details of who suspect Salman Abedi may have been working with when he detonated explosives in an attack that targeted teenage concertgoers, but she said security services – which had been aware of Abedi “up to a point” before the bombing – are focusing on his visits to Libya, at least one of which was recent.
Her French counterpart, Interior Minister Gerard Collomb, said Abedi may have also gone to Syria, and had “proven” links with Islamic State.
British Prime Minister Theresa May’s Tuesday announcement, which takes Britain’s alert level from “severe” to its highest rating, “critical”, clears the way for thousands of British troops to take to the streets and replace police officers in guarding key sites.
May announced the move after chairing an emergency meeting of her security Cabinet, concluding that Abedi may have been part of a wider network poised to strike again. The decision, she said, was “a proportionate and sensible response to the threat that our security experts judge we face”.
The worst terrorist attack on British soil in over a decade was carried out by a British-born son of Libyan immigrants who was born and raised a short drive from the concert hall that he transformed from a scene of youthful celebration into a tableau of horror.
Health officials said that in addition to the dead, 20 people remained in “critical care” and were suffering from “horrific injuries”.
The attack at the close of a concert by American pop star Ariana Grande, was claimed by the Islamic State, saying one of its “soldiers” was responsible.
Even as officials and experts cast doubt on the terrorist group’s assertion, authorities were scrambling to execute searches, arrest potential accomplices and reinforce security systems at a spectrum of public events newly vulnerable to attacks like Monday’s.
After years of successfully fending off more-sophisticated strikes even as countries across continental Europe have fallen victim to bombings, Monday night’s carnage underscored that Britain is not immune amid a rising tide of extremist violence.
The highest priority for police, said Greater Manchester Chief Constable Ian Hopkins, was to “establish whether (Abedi) was acting alone or as part of a network”.
Earlier he had said Abedi executed the bombing alone and that he “was carrying an improvised explosive device, which he detonated, causing this atrocity”.
But experts said it was unlikely that Monday’s attack had been carried out without help.
“Getting a car or a knife is easy,” said Raffaello Pantucci, a terrorism expert at the London-based Royal United Services Institute.
“Making a bomb that works and goes off when you want it to go off takes preparation and practice.
“And it usually involves other people.”
Pantucci said British authorities “are going to try to figure out who (Abedi) knows, who he’s linked to.
“Did he build the bomb itself, or did someone build it and give it to him?”
If police have an answer, they did not say so publicly.
But there was a widening security operation, with the arrest of a 23-year-old from south Manchester in connection with the bombing.
Police also carried out searches at two homes, including the house where Abedi, 22, was registered as having lived.
A family friend said Abedi travelled frequently between Libya and Britain.