Police name third London terror attacker
Butt’s neighbours recall ‘friendly’ traits
LONDON: Police yesterday named the third attacker in the weekend terror assault in London amid mounting anger, two days before an election, over how the jihadist killers had apparently evaded surveillance.
With flags at half-mast, the nation fell silent yesterday at 11am to remember the seven killed and dozens injured on Saturday night — a mourning ritual now grimly familiar after two previous terror attacks in less than three months.
Police identified the third attacker as Youssef Zaghba, a 22-year-old Italian of Moroccan descent, a day after naming his accomplices as Khuram Shazad Butt, 27, a Pakistan-born Briton, and Rachid Redouane, 30, a self-described MoroccanLibyan dual national.
Butt “was known to the police and MI5” but there was no intelligence to suggest the attack was being planned, the Metropolitan Police said.
Zaghba was “not a police or MI5 subject of interest”, it added, an assertion that seemed to conflict with accounts in the Italian media.
Criticism immediately flared about how Butt was able to carry out the attack.
With questions mounting about whether authorities had let the killers slip through their fingers, the police confirmed that Butt “was known” to them and to MI5, the British intelligence service.
“However, there was no intelligence to suggest that this attack was being planned and the investigation had been prioritised accordingly,” the police said in a statement.
“The other named man, Rachid Redouane, was not known.”
Even so, Prime Minister Theresa May found herself on the defensive on Monday, as rivals challenged her record on security after the third terrorist episode in three months.
Ms May, who is leading her Conservative Party into a national election tomorrow, held the portfolio in charge of security for six years before replacing David Cameron as prime minister in July, and she oversaw a reduction in police forces, including armed officers, during that time.
London mayor Sadiq Khan said yesterday it will be harder to stop future terrorist attacks if Ms May wins tomorrow’s general election and carries out planned changes to the Metropolitan Police’s funding.
In a statement that praised the “tremendous bravery” of police during the attack, Mr Khan warned London would lose between 3,400 and 12,800 officers if the premier pushes through budget cuts proposed by her Conservative Party.
The Metropolitan Police released photographs on Monday of Butt, 27, and Redouane, 30.
Redouane had claimed to be Moroccan and Libyan, the police said, and also sometimes used a pseudonym, Rachid Elkhdar.
Butt appeared briefly in a Channel 4 television documentary, The Jihadis Next Door, last year about extremists living in Britain.
The film featured a number of British Muslim men openly expressing their support for Islamist violence.
In one scene, Butt stands in line with five other men in Regent’s Park in London as another man kneels in front of them unfurling an Islamic State flag.
In Barking, residents of the Elizabeth Fry Apartments on Kings Road said Butt had lived in the building with his wife and young children, including a newborn.
“His wife just gave birth, the baby was two weeks old,” said Nasser Ali, who lives in the building facing Butt’s apartment.
Another neighbour said he would see Butt coming and going from the apartment complex.
“I just saw him going in and out,” said the neighbour, Shehzad Khurram. “I saw him walking his kids.”
It was the van that struck a chord with Ken Chigbo, one of Butt’s neighbours in Barking.
“He approached me about a week ago, making conversation, and found out I’m moving home,” Mr Chigbo recalled in a phone interview on Sunday, before the police had officially identified Butt as one of the attackers.
“He was just being polite. Then he said, ‘Look, Ken, where did you get your van from? How much did you pay? Do they do it in automatic?’”
The two men met barely a week after Mr Chigbo moved into the complex three years ago. “He invited me and everyone to a barbecue in the block’s shared garden green area a week ago,” Mr Chigbo said. “He’s a neighbour. I trusted him, we got on.”
Sarah Sekyejwe, who lives with her husband and children in the newly built row of houses next to the Elizabeth Fry Apartments, said Butt had moved to the street in 2014 and befriended the local children.
“My daughter says he’s the one who on Halloween would open the door and give them lots of sweets,” she recalled. “And in the summer he put out a table-tennis table and taught the kids how to play.”
Mr Chigbo said small groups of three or four “Muslim guys” used to regularly visit Butt’s apartment.
“I found them quite intimidating, actually,” he said.
“They were always in religious robes and wearing red and white checkered scarves wrapped around their heads.”
Twelve people were arrested in the investigation into the terror attack, and homes in East London were raided. But on Monday night, the police said that all those in custody had been “released without charge”.
The main political parties suspended campaigning on Sunday as a sign of respect for the seven people killed and the scores wounded in the attack, but as electioneering resumed on Monday, so did the pressure on Ms May.
Although there has been widespread praise for the professionalism and courage of the armed officers who shot and killed the assailants within eight minutes of being called Saturday night, the country’s broader anti-terrorism strategy was questioned.
“I am so sick of Theresa May blaming others for terror when the system she presided over has obviously failed so lamentably,” Steve Hilton, once a close adviser to Mr Cameron, wrote on Twitter.
Ms May, he added in a separate tweet, “should be resigning, not seeking re-election”.
Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of the opposition Labour Party, when asked by a reporter if he would support calls for Ms May’s resignation over the falling number of police officers, replied: “Indeed, I would.”
Stung by the criticism just days before a national election that will decide her political future, Ms May responded at a news conference.
“We have protected counterterrorism policing budgets,” she said. “We have also provided funding for an increase in the number of armed police officers.”
A focus on security would normally be expected to help the prospects of Ms May’s Tories in the approaching election. But as the investigation builds, so does speculation of potential security lapses that could have been prevented, possibly along with Saturday night’s attack.
Late on Sunday, Mr Corbyn criticised the decrease in the number of police officers since 2010. “You cannot protect the public on the cheap,” he said.
Mr Corbyn also accused the government of failing to publish a report, undertaken in early 2016, on foreign financing of extremist groups, for fear of upsetting foreign governments, although he himself is vulnerable on security issues.
He has demonstrated past support for Irish republicans and expressed doubts two years ago about a so-called shoot-tokill policy for police officers during serious terrorist attacks.