How trio escaped under radar

BRITISH authorities are facing a number of questions after the London Bridge attack.

Reports about all three terrorists who carried out the atrocity have prompted intense scrutiny of bodies including the police, MI5 and the Home Office. Khuram Shazad Butt The 27-year-old had appeared on the radar of security services and was investigated in 2015.

He is alleged to have been an associate of notorious preacher Anjem Choudary, and appeared in the 2016 Channel 4 Islamic extremist documentary The Jihadis Next Door. Butt was also reported to the anti-terror hotline in 2015 for showing signs of “extremism or radicalisation”.

Scotland Yard has confirmed he was known to police and MI5 but said there was “no intelligence to suggest that this attack was being planned” and the probe “had been prioritised accordingly”.

Going forward, the spotlight is likely to fall on the system used by counter-terror agencies to assess and prioritise threats, as well as the decisions made specifically in the case of Butt. Questions have also been raised about whether they have the resources to contain the threat, which is seen as unprecedented, with 500 live investigations involving 3,000 individuals.

In addition to this, there is a group of around 20,000 former “subjects of interest” whose risk remains “subject to review”. Youssef Zaghba The Home Office was drawn into the controversy after claims emerged that Zaghba was able to enter Britain despite being placed on an EU-wide watch list. Unconfirmed reports suggest security authorities in Italy had placed the 22-year-old on the Schengen Information System (SIS II).

However, an Italian prosecutor said there was not enough evidence to arrest or charge Zaghba when he was intercepted at Bologna airport in March last year.

The Home Office has not commented as there is an ongoing police investigation, while Scotland Yard has said Zaghba was not a police or MI5 subject of interest. Rachid Redouane Redouane, 30, who claimed to be Moroccan-Libyan, reportedly sought asylum in the UK but had the application rejected in 2009.

It is believed he used Irish jurisdiction to get a European Union permit which later allowed him to be in the UK.

Security sources in Ireland confirmed he married a British woman in Dublin in 2012.

The marriage reportedly allowed him to obtain a 4 EU FAM card given to spouses of European Union citizens.

Police have said Redouane was “not known”.