UK TERROR ATTACK Two more ‘significant arrests’ over assault
Global toll for an assailant born in UK
LONDON: Two more people have been arrested over Wednesday’s terror attack in London, police said yesterday. They also gave the attacker’s birth name as Adrian Russell and appealed to the public for information about him.
“We have made two further significant arrests overnight,” counter-terrorism commander Mark Rowley said, confirming that there are currently nine people in total in custody over the attack.
One woman arrested earlier was released on bail.
Police had earlier named the attacker as Khalid Masood but said he had been using “a number of aliases”.
Mr Rowley said police carried out more than a dozen searches, seizing 2,700 items including “massive amounts of computer data” and were attempting to work out whether others had “encouraged, supported or directed him”.
The Islamic State group took responsibility, saying the attacker was one of its “soldiers”.
“There might be people out there who did have concerns about Masood but did not feel comfortable for whatever reason in passing those concerns to us,” Mr Rowley said, appealing for them to come forward.
The anti-terror police chief said “at least 50” people were injured when Masood ploughed through pedestrians on Westminster Bridge before knifing a policeman to death just inside the gates of Britain’s parliament and being shot dead by another officer.
A total of 31 people of 12 nationalities have been treated in hospital and one person has “life-threatening injuries”, Mr Rowley said.
A 75-year-old man who died of his injuries in hospital yesterday brought the number of victims to four.
The roster of the dead and wounded spans the globe: a veteran Scotland Yard constable, a Mormon couple from Utah, South Korean t ourists, French high schoolers and Romanian lovers.
Ms May visited victims at a hospital in London for 40 minutes on Thursday, according to her office. Details about most have not been released, but some information has dribbled out:
Police Constable Keith Palmer, a 48-year old husband and father, who was a member of the Parliamentary and Diplomatic Protection Command, was patrolling the parliament building when the assailant fatally stabbed him. He previously served in the British army. Prime Minister Theresa May called him “every inch a hero”.
Tributes for Palmer have poured in and the Metropolitan Police announced on Twitter that his badge number would be retired.
“Keith Palmer was killed while bravely doing his duty — protecting our city and the heart of our democracy from those who want to destroy our way of life,” London’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, said.
Kurt Cochran, a US citizen travelling in Europe with his wife, Melissa Payne Cochran, died of injuries, according to a statement from the family issued through the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Salt Lake City.
Clint Payne, Cochran’s brother-in-law, said in the statement that the couple had been travelling in Europe for their 25th wedding anniversary and had been scheduled to fly home on Thursday. He called Cochran “a good man and a loving husband”.
Cochran’s wife was wounded in the attack and taken to hospital with “a broken leg, a broken rib and a cut on her head”, her sister, Sarah Payne-Mcfarlane, said in a Facebook post.
Aysha Frade, 43, a British teacher who lived in London, was fatally injured as she was heading to pick up her two daughters. She taught Spanish not far from Westminster Bridge, according to the Spanish newspaper La Voz de Galicia, and she had family in Spain, according to the Spanish foreign ministry.
Leslie Rhodes, 75, from Streatham in south London was injured in the attack and died of his wounds on Thursday evening, police said. “The man had been receiving medical treatment in hospital following the attack and life support was withdrawn this
evening,” the police said in a statement.
The injured also included three 10thgrade boys from the Brittany region of France who were on the bridge with other visiting students and who suffered leg and arm fractures. On Thursday, the French education ministry said their conditions were no longer life-threatening.
Five South Koreans were wounded when they were mobbed by a crowd fleeing the attack site, according to the South Korean Foreign Ministry. Four of them — three women and a man in their 50s and 60s — suffered fractures and other injuries. A 67-year-old woman, however, required surgery for a head injury, according to South Korean news reports.
The two Romanian victims, Andreea Cristea, 31, and Andrei Burnaz, 32, were from the Black Sea port city of Constanta, according to the Romanian news agency Mediafax, which quoted an official as saying they had been visiting London to celebrate Mr Burnaz’s birthday.
Ms Cristea was rescued after she plunged off the bridge into the Thames as the assailant careened the SUV through the crowd, and news reports said she suffered serious head injuries and lung damage. Mr Burnaz’s foot was fractured.
An area outside Parliament remained a large crime scene as police officers examined the pavement stones for clues.
The Palace of Westminster, which includes the Houses of Parliament, is a bewildering warren of corridors and the work of ensuring that it was clear of assailants took time in the immediate aftermath of the assault. A group of visiting schoolchildren — some in tears — were among those caught up in the confusion, which lasted for hours.
Lawmakers were confined to specific areas, where they were given water and in some cases sandwiches. But what some lacked most of all was the power to communicate and to check that their staff was safe.
Overall, the atmosphere was one of calm and cooperation, however. “People appreciated the gravity of the situation,” said Nigel Evans, a Conservative lawmaker.
That may have been partly because an attack of this type had not been completely unexpected. Security has been noticeably tightened in Parliament in recent years, with large barriers placed in front of parts of the building to thwart the threat of a truck bomb. Police officers with submachine guns patrol the Parliament grounds routinely.
On Thursday, with tightened security, lawmakers crowded into the parliamentary chamber determined to show that they would not be deterred. Ed Miliband, a former leader of the opposition Labour Party, said the mood had been one of “shock and determination and also admiration for the job that the security people are doing”.
“I think we are seeing people’s increased determination to carry on with their normal business,” he said.