Bombing probe turns to ISIS ties in Libya
The bomber who killed 22 people at a pop concert in Manchester, England, last month had met in Libya with members of an Islamic State unit linked to the November 2015 Paris terrorist attack, according to current and retired intelligence officials.
The content of the communications between the attacker, Salman Abedi, and the terrorist cell remains unknown. But the possibility that he was directed or enabled by Islamic State operatives in Libya, as opposed to Syria, suggests that even as the group’s Middle East base is shrinking, at least one of its remote franchises is developing ways to continue attacks within Europe.
On visits to Tripoli as well as to the coastal Libyan town of Sabratha, Abedi met with operatives of the Katibat al-Battar alLibi, a core Islamic State unit that was headquartered in Syria before some of its members dispersed to Libya.
Originally made up of Libyans who had gone to Syria to fight in the civil war, the unit became a magnet for French and Belgian foreign fighters, and several were dispatched to carry out attacks abroad. Some of the terrorist group’s most devastating hits in Europe, including the coordinated attack in Paris in 2015, were shaped by alumni of the brigade.
The contacts between Abedi and Battar members occurred when he went to Libya, especially in Tripoli and Sabratha, according to a retired European intelligence chief, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss details of the case. The former official added that Abedi kept up contact with the group after returning to Manchester, his hometown.
When Abedi was in Britain, the contacts would sometimes happen by phone, the retired official said. If the content of the call was sensitive, Abedi used phones that were disposable, or dispatches were sent from Libya by his contacts to his “friend” — living in Germany or Belgium — who then sent it to Abedi in Britain, according to the former intelligence chief.
Abedi’s contacts with the Battar brigade members in Libya — though not the details of the methods used to communicate or the specific locations — were confirmed by a senior U.S. intelligence official, who also spoke on the condition of anonymity.
Both officials said Abedi’s activities in Libya remained the focus of intensive investigations.
The leaders of the Islamic State, also known as ISIS, have been actively coordinating with loyalists in Libya since at least the start of 2015, sending personnel back from Syria to help them establish their fledgling colony. Their Libyan province, headquartered in the port city of Sirte, grew to become their most important outside of Iraq and Syria.
After nearly two years, the Libyan branch recently lost ground, with its forces routed from more than 100 miles of coastline. But no one believes the group has been destroyed there — instead it has dispersed, while maintaining its operational abilities.
The Battar brigade was formed by Libyan fighters who were seasoned veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan. It was among the first foreign jihadi contingent to arrive in Syria in 2012, as the country’s popular revolt was sliding into a broader civil war and Islamist insurgency, said Cameron Colquhoun, formerly a senior counterterrorism analyst at Britain’s Government Communications Headquarters, or GCHQ , its surveillance and intelligence agency.
U.S. officials have been concerned about the Libyan ISIS franchise’s development for a long time.