Armed police on the streets

Ministry of Defence police officers have been drafted in to join armed teams from Kent Police on the county’s streets.

The patrols started on Friday to help protect Kent from an increased threat of terrorism.

It comes after the national threat level was raised to “critical” following the terror attack in Manchester on Monday last week. The attack left 22 people dead and dozens more injured at an Ariana Grande concert at Manchester Arena.

Armed police officers have been spotted patrolling in Ashford town centre following the heightened terror threat.

A police spokesman said: “Kent Police are liaising with the Home Office to regularly assess the national threat levels and what that means for our county.

“Highly-visible firearms offic- ers are already patrolling key locations in Kent as part of our current deployment and as a result of this on-going work, additional police officer patrols have been arranged.

“From Friday, May 26, this will also include officers from the Ministry of Defence Police who will support their armed Kent colleagues.”

The MoD officers will be patrolling key locations to provide additional security and will be under Kent Police’s control.

It comes after an announcement that armed police will start patrolling trains for the first time. Members of the public are asked to remain alert but not alarmed.

Eurostar responded to a request for a comment on security at its stations, including Ashford International, following the Manchester attack.

A spokesman said: “We already operate at the highest level, in line with the policy set by the relevant authorities in the countries that we operate in. We take the safety and security of our passengers very seriously and operate with the strictest security regime of any train operator.

“These security requirements are defined and regularly audited by the relevant authorities in each country that we operate in and are comparable to those undertaken at airports.”

Anyone who witnesses anything suspicious is asked to report it to the Anti Terrorist Hotline 0800 789 321.

Armed police officers patrol streets in Ashford because of the terrorism threat