Did bomber have an accomplice?

INTELLIGENCE officers are examining the possibility that Salman Abedi may have had an accomplice who watched him as he entered the Manchester Arena foyer.

Evidence from the crime scene leaked in the US apparently pointed to a remote mobile-phone detonator with built-in redundancies to enable someone else to set it off. It suggests another jihadist would have watched Abedi and was ready to blow up the explosives remotely if he backed out of the attack at the last minute.

But initial analysis points to the fact Abedi did blow himself up.

Investigators also believe he may have had the expertise to create the sophisticated device himself. Security agencies are trying to establish whether Abedi travelled to Syria to meet up with extremists to learn to build improvised explosive devices.

It comes amid fears the network of extremists linked to him have developed sophisticated weaponry.

The explosives in the bomb were also the same as those used in the Paris and Brussels attacks, a US lawmaker said. He pointed to a possible link to the same terrorist network.

The chair of the US House of Representatives’ homeland security committee, Mike McCaul, said Abedi’s backpack was loaded with TATP, the explosive used in Paris and Brussels.