Terror suspect came to UK from Sudan just 8 years ago
THE Sudanese-born suspect in the Westminster attack on Tuesday came to Britain eight years ago as a refugee, it was revealed yesterday.
Salih Khater, 29, told authorities he was fleeing war and persecution in his native Sudan and wanted a new life in Britain.
However, security sources said he was allegedly facing an investigation into ‘irregularities’ in his successful application for UK citizenship. The Home Office refused to comment.
His family insisted he was a ‘normal person’ with no links to fanaticism, and said they were in a ‘state of shock’ over his arrest on suspicion of terror offences and attempted murder.
He allegedly ploughed a Ford Fiesta into cyclists outside Parliament in the morning rush hour, before crashing into a security barrier.
Despite having fled the country of his birth, the shop manager claimed he was going to London to apply for a visa to visit his family in Sudan. The embassy in St James’s Park is less than a mile from Westminster.
He had only recently been told that his application for British citizenship was successful, meaning he could apply for a passport.
Friends said he wanted to mourn his father, who was reportedly killed in a car crash in Sudan, and had appeared depressed after he was thrown off a Coventry University accountancy course for failing his first year.
Khater is not believed to have been known to security services or to appear on terror warning lists, although he was reportedly known to West Midlands Police.
His brother, Abdullah, insisted Khater had shown no signs of extremism or radicalisation, and officials at a mosque in Birmingham said he was ‘not a fervent worshipper’. Speaking from Sudan, Abdullah told the BBC: ‘He called us by telephone and told us he wanted our company after his years in Britain.’
Khater grew up with two brothers and a sister at Wad Madani, in eastern Sudan, where his parents farmed the cereal grain sorghum.
According to his Facebook profile, he studied electrical engineering at the Sudan University of Science and Technology in the capital, Khartoum.
The BBC reported that Khater left Sudan in 2008 and spent two years working as a farm labourer in Libya before travelling on to Britain in 2010.
Associates believed he crossed the Mediterranean and Europe alone, with his younger brother following him to Britain later.
Last night, a source close to the investigation suggested a tenth floor council flat searched by police in the Highgate area of Birmingham, overlooking the central mosque, was his brother’s home.
Police have also searched Khater’s previous home in nearby Sparkbrook and an internet café where he used a computer 24 hours before driving to London. He paid 50p to use the internet for 30 minutes, and police seized the computer, its hard drive and CCTV from the Bunna Internet Café.
It is unclear how Khater arrived in Britain, but once here he claimed his family were part of the Zaghawa Muslim ethnic group which has faced persecution in the Darfur region of Sudan, forcing more than 100,000 people to flee the country as refugees. Government statistics showed more than 570 asylum seekers arrived in Britain from Sudan in 2010, and 365 were granted asylum.
Of those, many are likely to have fled the genocide in Darfur, although the Home Office has taken action to return some asylum seekers if their claims to have been persecuted were not proven. Ali Mohammed, a Sudanese community leader in Birmingham, said Khater had wanted to return to Sudan to visit his family.
Nassar Mahmood, a Birmingham Central Mosque trustee, said Khater had shown no signs of radicalisation, adding: ‘Like the rest of the community of the UK, the people of Birmingham and the Birmingham Central Mosque are surprised, shocked and saddened by the incident at Westminster.’
Friends said he was a quiet man who supported Aston Villa and liked listening to Celine Dion. Khater remains under arrest in custody in a South London police station. Scotland Yard’s counterterrorism unit is spearheading the police investigation amid fears that the incident was a deliberate attack on the capital.
Westminster magistrates last night granted officers a warrant to detain Khater until Monday.
The investigation is expected to probe any links between Khater and known extremists in Sparkbrook, where he had settled. British-born killer Khalid Masood, who carried out the Westminster Bridge attack last year, lived ten minutes away, although the two are not known to have been in contact. The area has also been linked to several jihadi plots.
Officers will also question why Khater spent more than six hours driving around London – including tourist hotspots around Tottenham Court Road, Whitehall and Westminster – leading to suspi-
‘Not a fervent worshipper’ ‘It appears to have been deliberate’
cions he may have been hunting for crowds to target.
Witnesses said he appeared to use the car ‘deliberately’ as a weapon, swerving the wrong way down a road and across a pedestrian crossing, hitting cyclists.
A Met Police spokesman said: ‘At the time of the arrest, there was nobody else in the vehicle, which has been removed from the scene and searched. No weapons have been recovered at this stage.
‘Given that it appears to have been a deliberate act, the method used and the iconic location, it is being treated as a terrorist incident. The priority continues to be to understand the motivation behind this incident.’