Salman Abedi killed 22 people in the Manchester attack (Picture: PA) Intelligence bosses missed key warnings about suicide bomber Salman Abedi that could prevented the Manchester Arena attack. Key warnings about Abedi’s ‘suspicious behavior’ could have put the attacker under surveillance as a ‘high-priority’ target before he murdered 22 people, it has been reported. Five arrested following huge police operation in Notting Hill MI5 officials received at least two items of intelligence about the bomber that indicated he posed a serious threat, before he went on to kill concertgoers at an Ariana Grande concert in May. The findings come from an internal review at the agency, thought to have been sent to Home Secretary Amber Rudd last week. According to the Sunday Times, the review has triggered deep concerns within the intelligence community that the attack – the deadliest in Britain since the 2005 London bombings – could have been stopped. And MI5 director-general Andrew Parker is said to be in danger of losing his job as a result. In a speech last month, Parker claimed MI5 used the ‘harsh light of hindsight to squeeze out every last drop of learning so that we can be the very best we can be, now and in the future’. MI5 received warnings about Abedi (Picture: PAUL ELLIS/AFP/Getty) The internal review – commissioned by Parker alongside Metropolitan police commissioner Cressida Dick – reportedly focused on intelligence passed on to an MI5 regional office which originally deemed it not of high importance. But the report found it should have raised triggered serious alarms about Abedi. Schoolgirls, 13 and 14, seriously injured in stabbing on playing field An anonymous intelligence source told the Sunday Times: ‘There were a few calls made regarding several bits of intelligence which, if judged differently at the time, would have turned Abedi into a high-priority case. ‘And when a target is judged a high priority, you should place them under surveillance. ‘The greater the threat, the more resources you deploy for surveillance.’ MORE: UK Police said they hoped missing boy 'got raped' in voicemail to his mum Theresa May's odds slashed to leave as PM in 2017 Woman, 107, has parking ticket overturned because she couldn't walk fast enough to her car However a Whitehall source is said to have told The Sunday Times that the key intelligence received was not deemed ‘definitive’ of a specific plot. The former independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, David Anderson QC, has carried out an ‘independent assurance’ of the review and a redacted version is due to be released to the public later this month. Parker last month revealed MI5 is working on 500 active operations and had stopped seven terror plots in as many months.
MI5 officials missed key intelligence warnings that could have put the Manchester bomber under surveillance as a “high-priority” target before he murdered 22 people, The Sunday Times can reveal.
The security service received at least two items of intelligence regarding Salman Abedi’s “suspicious behaviour” that indicated he posed a serious threat before his suicide bombing at the Manchester Arena in May.
The failure to act properly on the intelligence emerged in an MI5 internal review that has triggered deep concerns within the intelligence community about whether the attack — the deadliest in Britain since the 2005 London bombings — could have been stopped. The findings are thought to have been sent to Amber Rudd, the home secretary, last week.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kgYy6OJEQGQ _________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
This documentary whilst reviews the Manchester attack from the 22nd of May 2017, is also an explaination as to why EVERYONE must review anything that is presented to them and not get caught up in the media's whirlwind. _________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
Not sure about the above
Looks like could be perpetrator inspired 'alternative media'
Just not enough evidence for me
Bizarre that Critical Thinker says it's wrong to criticise private security because that's an 'obvious sign' they're trying to increase security spending & help private security firms
This is the real deal
According to Scotland Yard, the attack on the crowd leaving the Ariana Grande concert at Manchester Arena, 22 May, has been perpetrated by Salman Abedi. A bankcard has been conveniently found in the pocket of the mutilated corpse of the ‘terrorist’.
This attack is generally interpreted as proof that the United Kingdom is not implicated in international terrorism and that, on the contrary, it is a victim of it.
Salman Abedi was born in the UK of a family of Libyan immigrants. He has travelled to Libya several times in the last couple of months, with or without his father.
His father Ramadan Abedi, with whom Salman lived, is a former officer in [Gaddafi’s] Libyan Intelligence Services. He specialised in the surveillance of the Islamist movement, but two decades later has failed to notice that his son has joined Daesh (IS).
In 1992, Ramadan Abedi was sent back to Libya by Britain’s MI6 and was involved in a British-devised plot to assassinate Muammar Gaddafi. The operation having been readily exposed, he was exfiltrated by MI6 and transferred back to the UK where he obtained political asylum. He moved in 1999 to Whalley Range (south of Manchester) where there was already resident a small Libyan Islamist community.
In 1994, Ramadan Abedi returned again to Libya under MI6’s direction. In late 1995 he is involved in the creation of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), a local branch of Al-Qaeda, in conjunction with Abdelhakim Belhadj. The LIFG was then employed by MI6 again to assassinate Gaddafi, for a payoff of £100,000. This operation, which also failed, provoked heated exchanges within British Intelligence, leading to the resignation of one David Shayler.
Other former members of the LIFG have also lived at Whalley Range, including Abedi’s friend Abd al-Baset-Azzouz. In 2009, this last joined Al-Qaeda in Pakistan and became a close associate of its chief, Ayman al-Zawahiri. In 2011, al-Baset-Azzouz is active on the ground with the NATO operation against Libya. On 11 September 2012, he directs the operation against the US Ambassador in Libya, Christopher Stevens, assassinated at Benghazi. He is arrested in Turkey and extradited to the US in December 2014, his trial still pending.
Nobody pays attention to the fact that Ramadan Abedi has linked LIFG members to the formation of Al-Qaeda in Iraq and, in 2011, he takes part in MI6’s ‘Arab Spring’ operations, and in LIFG’s role on the ground in support of NATO. In any event, Abedi returned to Libya after the fall of Gaddafi and moves his family there, leaving his older children in the family home at Whalley Range.
According to the former Spanish Prime Minister José Maria Aznar, Abdelhakim Belhadj was involved in the assassinations in Madrid of 11 March 2004. Later, he is secretly arrested in Malaysia by the CIA and transferred to Libya where he is tortured not by Libyan or American functionaries but by MI6 agents. He is finally freed after the accord between Saif al-Islam Gaddafi [Gaddafi’s son] and the jihadists.
During the Libyan war, Belhadj, who had been living in Qatar, returned to Libya, courtesy of the Qatari Emir, and commanded the operations on the ground in league with NATO. On 28 July 2011, he organised the assassination of General Abdul Fatah Younis who claimed to have joined the ‘rebels’, but who Belhadj accused of overseeing the struggle against the LIFG during the 1990s.
In September 2011, Belhadj was named military governor of Tripoli by NATO. In 2012, seconded by the Irish-Libyan Mahdi al-Hatari, he created the Free Syrian Army, then returns again to Libya. On 2 May 2014, he is received officially at the Quai d’Orsay [the French Foreign Ministry].
In December 2013, following the discovery in the archives of Gaddafi’s Libyan regime of a letter from the former chief of MI6, Belhadj launches proceedings in London against the UK for having kidnapped and tortured him nine years earlier. British Intelligence then illegally places his lawyers under phone-tapping, although it is ultimately constrained to destroy the intelligence obtained.
According to Egypt’s Prosecutor General, Hisham Barakat, in May 2015, Belhadj becomes Daesh’ most senior figure in North Africa, this claim taken up by Interpol. Belhadj installs three training camps for Daesh in Libya at Derna (in the former property of Abd al-Baset-Azzouz), at Syrte and at Sebrata. In October 2016, he launches in London new legal proceedings regarding his kidnapping and torture, this time nominally against the former director of MI6, Sir Mark Allen.
Daesh has claimed responsibility for the Manchester attack, but without describing Salman Abedi as a ‘martyr’. After the assassination, Ramadan Abedi has declared his opposition to jihad in a telephone conversation with journalists. He has also claimed that his son had intended to spend the month of Ramadan [beginning 26 May] with him in Libya and that he is convinced of his innocence.
DgkywafXcAAd3JI.jpg
Description:
Filesize:
151.15 KB
Viewed:
685 Time(s)
_________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
Last edited by Whitehall_Bin_Men on Tue Jun 26, 2018 10:33 am; edited 1 time in total
Manchester bomber Salman Abedi
Robert Mendick, chief reporter Gordon Rayner, political editor Martin Evans Hayley Dixon
6 JUNE 2017 • 3:06PM
The Manchester suicide bomber was repeatedly flagged to the authorities over his extremist views, but was not stopped by officers, it emerged Wednesday night.
Counter Terrorism agencies were facing questions after it emerged Salman Abedi told friends that “being a suicide bomber was okay”, prompting them to call the Government’s anti-terrorism hotline.
Sources suggest that authorities were informed of the danger posed by Abedi on at least five separate occasions in the five years prior to the attack on Monday night.
Manchester Arena bomber Salman Abedi
Manchester Arena bomber Salman Abedi
The authorities were also aware that Abedi’s father was linked to a well-known militant Islamist group in Libya, which is proscribed in Britain. Abedi also had links to several British-based jihadis with Isil connections.
Yesterday his father was detained by Libyan militia in the capital Tripoli while the suicide bomber’s two brothers have separately been arrested on suspicion of terrorism offences.
Father of Salman Abedi, the Manchester Arena bomber
Father of Salman Abedi, the Manchester Arena bomber
The apparent lapses emerged on a day of heightened police activity as the hunt for Abedi’s terror cell intensified.
Officers raided the suspected ‘bomb factory’ where it is feared he made the device before the attack.
Last night the Home Secretary conceded that Abedi was known the intelligence services, while counter terrorism officials were braced for criticism over the apparent failures
It came as:
It emerged security services are examining links between Abedi and an expert bomb-maker who had lived in the same street in Manchester
Leaked pictures last night emerged in the US of fragments of the bomb, prompting a diplomatic row between the Downing Street and the US security services.
Britain was placed on security lock down with soldiers on the streets and several high-profile events cancelled
The general election will resume with Ukip’s general election manifesto launch today
A minute’s silence will be held on Thursday morning at 11am in memory of the victims
A female police officer was revealed as one of the bomb victims, as further identities emerged
The missed opportunities to catch Abedi were beginning to mount up last night. The Telegraph has spoken to a community leader who said that Abedi was reported two years ago “because he thought he was involved in extremism and terrorism”.
Mohammed Shafiq, chief executive of the Ramadhan Foundation, said: “People in the community expressed concerns about the way this man was behaving and reported it in the right way using the right channels.
“They did not hear anything since.”
Two friends of Abedi also became so worried they separately telephoned the police counter-terrorism hotline five years ago and again last year.
“They had been worried that ‘he was supporting terrorism’ and had expressed the view that ‘being a suicide bomber was ok’,” a source told the BBC.
Akram Ramadan, 49, part of the close-knit Libyan community in south Manchester, said Abedi had been banned from Didsbury Mosque after he had confronted the Imam who was delivering an anti-extremist sermon.
A police forensic investigator at an address in Elsmore Road, Greater Manchester, after a suicide bomber killed 22 people, including children, as an explosion tore through fans leaving a pop concert in Manchester
A police forensic investigator at an address in Elsmore Road, Greater Manchester, after a suicide bomber killed 22 people, including children, as an explosion tore through fans leaving a pop concert in Manchester CREDIT: PA
Mr Ramadan said he understood that Abedi had been placed on a “watch list” because the mosque reported him to the authorities for his extremist views.
A well-placed source at Didsbury Mosque confirmed it had contacted the Home Office’s Prevent anti-radicalisation programme as a result.
A US official also briefed that members of Abedi’s own family had contacted British police saying that he was “dangerous”, but again the information does not appear to have been acted upon.
Abedi's own family background might also have been a red flag to authorities. His father was a member of the militant Libyan Islamic Fighting Group.
Yet Abedi was able to travel frequently between the UK and Libya, where it is feared he trained in bombmaking and possibly travelled to Syria.
His youngest brother, Hisham - who is photographed on social media wielding an automatic rifle - was yesterday arrested by the Libyans who suspect him of knowing about the Manchester plot in advance and plotting his own attack in Tripoli.
A spokesman for the Libyan authorities told BBC2's Newsnight that one of Abedi's final acts before the murders was to ring his mother. The spokesman said: "His brother felt there was something going on there in Manchester and he thought his brother would do something like bombing or attack. So after that, he told us, 'Having internet, I see the attack in Manchester and I knew that's my brother'."
The spokesman added that Libyan authorities were aware of Abedi going to the capital of Tripoli on April 18 and believed he stayed for two or three weeks.
He revealed that Abedi's younger brother Hashim had been investigated for about a month and a half over suspicions that he was linked to IS.
"We were not quite sure about this, but when we arrested and we asked him, he told us, 'I have ideology with my brother'. Hashim told us, 'I know everything about my brother, what he was doing there in Manchester'."
US authorities said Abedi was known to them prior to the atrocity while France’s interior minister said the 22-year-old had “proven” links with Islamic State and that both British and French intelligence services had information that the attacker had been in Syria.
Police forensic investigators at an address in Elsmore Road, Greater Manchester, after a suicide bomber killed 22 people, including children, as an explosion tore through fans leaving a pop concert in Manchester
Police forensic investigators at an address in Elsmore Road, Greater Manchester, after a suicide bomber killed 22 people, including children, as an explosion tore through fans leaving a pop concert in Manchester CREDIT: PA
Amber Rudd, the Home Secretary, disclosed that the intelligence services had been aware of Abedi, who had only in the past few weeks returned to the UK after visiting Libya.
Rudd told Sky News: “We do know that he was known up to a point to the intelligence services.”
Ramadan Abedi, the suicide bomber’s father who lives in Tripoli, gave a series of interviews yesterday in which he denied his son was to blame.
Mr Abedi told Bloomberg: “I was really shocked when I saw the news, I still don’t believe it.
“He was always against those attacks, saying there’s no religious justification for them. I don’t understand how he’d have become involved in an attack that led to the killing of children.”
But a friend of the family said Abedi’s parents had become so concerned about his behaviour they had ordered him to leave the UK and live with them in Libya.
Adel Elghrani said: “The father was so concerned he confiscated his passport. But then Salman went to his mother and said that he wanted to go on a pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia and she gave him his passport back and he came to England instead.”
Abedi then flew back to Britain, carrying out his deadly attack a few weeks later.
Counter-terrorism officers now believe that Abedi rented a flat in the days before the attack and stayed there until around 7pm on the night of the Ariana Grande concert at the Manchester Arena.
He carried the bomb to the destination in a rucksack and detonated it at just after 10.30pm as the US pop star was completing her last song.
Sources last night told The Daily Telegraph that there were two separate bomb factories, with the chemicals mixed in the flat in Granby Row before the bomb itself was assembled elsewhere.
It was not clear if the second flat had been discovered.
The photographs of the bomb fragments were leaked to the New York Times hours after Ms Rudd had said leaks of intelligence shared with the US authorities had to stop.
It prompted fury in Whitehall, with Ms Rudd and the Attorney General Jeremy Wright understood to be among officials who phoned their counterparts in the US to demand answers.
The Daily Telegraph understands that there is such serious concern about the leak that Theresa May will raise it with President Donald Trump when she sees him at a Nato meeting in Brussels today.
A senior Whitehall source described the leak as “unacceptable” and said the US authorities had been left “in no doubt about our huge strength of feeling on this issue”.
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Tue Mar 27, 2018 11:38 pm Post subject:
So Manchester police lied about an 'active shooter' for which there was no evidence, and kept the first aid trained firefighters out of their crime scene for two whole hours!
Manchester attack: Firefighters did not respond to bombing for two hours because of false alarm over 'active shooter'
Review praises ‘acts of bravery and selflessness’ by emergency services
Firefighters did not respond to the Manchester bombing for two hours because of a false 'active shooter' threat
Firefighters did not respond to the Manchester attack for two hours because they believed a gunman could be on the loose, a report has found.
Lord Kerslake, the former head of the civil service, praised “individual acts of bravery and selflessness” by the emergency services and members of the public following the bombing on 22 May last year but said communication failures delayed vital parts of the response.
Isis supporter Salman Abedi detonated his device in the foyer of Manchester Arena as thousands of young Ariana Grande fans poured out of a concert, killing 22 people and injuring more than 100.
READ MORE
Nazi obsessive threatened to bomb mosques after Manchester attack
Manchester attack ‘hero’ admits stealing purse and phone
MI5 may have been able to stop Manchester terror attack, inquiry finds
Police were on the scene one minute later and declared a major incident at 10.39pm, just eight minutes after the explosion.
Firefighters stationed nearby heard the blast themselves and prepared for mobilisation, but initial fears of an “active shooter” meant they did not arrive at the scene for two hours despite having first-aid skills and terror-attack training.
“The effect of this was that a valuable resource was not available to assist on the scene, particularly with the movement of those who were injured from the foyer” amid a shortage of stretchers, Lord Kerslake concluded.
“The fire service was effectively ‘outside the loop’, having no presence at the rendezvous point established by the police, little awareness of what was happening at the arena and only a very limited and belated presence at Strategic Gold Command.”
Lord Kerslake said firefighters interviewed during the review felt they had left Manchester down but said “they did not, but their procedures, communications and operational culture most certainly did ... it is incredible”.
0:00
/
0:00
Manchester attack: City pays tribute
He said firefighters stationed near Manchester Arena “could see that something was happening and wanted to go forward, but were prevented from doing so” and could not deploy themselves.
There were only three paramedics in the foyer at the time, triaging patients to be taken to a designated casualty clearing station for treatment alongside British Transport Police officers, security guards, staff from Manchester Victoria station and members of the public.
All injured people were evacuated from the blast site within just over an hour of the explosion, but Lord Kerslake said the presence of firefighters “would clearly have been valuable”.
The impact of the delay will be examined by the coroner in ongoing inquests into the 22 victims’ deaths, while a separate criminal investigation continues.
READ MORE
Manchester attack survivors ‘watched victims die waiting for help’
A previous review by the former Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation found that MI5 might have been able to prevent the attack, having dismissed two pieces of intelligence on Abedi that were “highly relevant” to his plans.
He had already been put under active investigation twice – once over his contact with another subject of interest in 2014, when he was considered a “low residual risk”, and again in October 2015 because of indirect contact with an Isis figure in Libya – and was not questioned when he returned to Britain from the country four days before the bombing.
The North West Fire Control initially received reports of a potential gunman from the ambulance service, but despite police confirming that wounds were caused by shrapnel rather than bullets a national liaison officer did not receive the information.
Suspecting a potential marauding terrorist shooting attack like those seen in Paris, he ordered firefighters to assemble at a station two miles from the arena according to procedures creating a 500m safety exclusion zone.
If all emergency services had followed the same guidance, only armed police wearing body armour would have been allowed to enter Manchester Arena’s foyer, but others used “situational awareness” to go in.
The national inter-agency liaison officer tried to speak to the police force duty officer to clarify what was happening but could not get through to him on the phone, the report said.
Manchester explosion in pictures
37
show all
It called for the fire service to reflect on “poor communication, poor procedures and issues of operational culture which caused its failure to respond properly”.
Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service’s interim chief fire officer Dawn Docx apologised “unreservedly”, adding: “Firefighters were desperate on the night to help and they were let down by some of their senior colleagues.”
She said no disciplinary action was planned, following the retirement of former fire chief Peter O’Reilly, and the service was “working to make sure this never happens again”.
The report also revealed that an emergency phone system provided by Vodafone “completely failed”, causing added distress to families frantically seeking information on their loved ones.
READ MORE
Victims of terror attacks by Isis, far-right and IRA join forces
Investigators said a restricted, local telephone service was not up and running until 3am, almost five hours after the bombing, leaving relatives to start desperate searches of local hospitals.
Vodafone has apologised and worked with the Home Office on measures to prevent similar issues occurring again, including a back-up system, testing and monitoring.
The review found that the horror was compounded by the actions of some members of the media, with relatives saying they were hounded and shown a lack of respect with behaviour the review called “utterly unacceptable”.
The Kerslake Arena Review was established by Andy Burnham, the Mayor of Greater Manchester, to examine the emergency response to the deadliest terror attack in Britain since the 7/7 bombings.
“By looking honestly at what happened, we can improve the way we protect the public, and begin to provide the families who lost loved ones and those injured, physically and mentally, with the answers to questions they have no doubt been asking ever since,” he said, announcing a wide-ranging review of Manchester’s fire and rescue service.
Lord Kerslake said the views of victims’ families and survivors had been “front and centre” in the review process.
manchester-attack-memorial.jpg
Tributes to victims of the Manchester attack (AFP/Getty)
“The Manchester Arena attack was devastating for many thousands of people,” he added.
“There is a lot to be proud of in the response to the attack, both for the city region of Greater Manchester, and for the emergency services.
“The benefits of collaborative working and planning for emergencies were demonstrated to the full. And there were hundreds, if not thousands, of individual acts of bravery and selflessness.
“But it’s also vital to learn the lessons around things that did not go so well. It matters not just for the people of Greater Manchester and beyond who were caught up in the terrible events of that night, but also for places that might be caught up in such an attack in the future.”
The report said the huge pressures on police charged with leading the response caused communication issues with other agencies, calling for new joint operating principles for responding to a terrorist attack to be drawn up nationally.
READ MORE
Timeline of MI5 investigations into UK terror attackers revealed
Mr Burnham backed the calls for a review of existing guidelines updated after the Paris, Sousse and Mumbai attacks, calling them “right on paper but wrong in practice”.
The report praised preparations and training undergone by the emergency services, the “good judgement” exercised at key points, such as meaning that police and paramedics were allowed to enter Manchester Arena despite safety fears.
The review found that actions by individuals and organisations on the night “demonstrated enormous bravery and compassion” and the civic response was “exceptional”, while support was provided by family liaison officers and bereavement nurses.
Chief Constable Ian Hopkins, of Greater Manchester Police, said officers had worked to save lives while being aware there may be a further attack.
“It was an immense and unprecedented situation that faced us and I am proud of the way the officers and staff of GMP responded that night and in the days, weeks and months that have followed,” he added.
“In the face of danger they ran into the arena as others were running away, they experienced things that no-one should have to experience.”
He said the criminal investigation into the attack was ongoing, with counter-terror officers working through more than 12,000 pieces of evidence and 2,000 statements.
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Sun Jun 17, 2018 10:20 am Post subject:
Police resume search for Manchester Arena attacker's suitcase
Officers return to rubbish tip on outskirts of city in search for Salman Abedi’s blue case
Helen Pidd North of England editor Mon 11 Jun 2018 17.05 BST
Salman Abedi carries a distinctive blue suitcase in Manchester city centre before the arena bombing. Photograph: Greater Manchester police/PA
Police investigating the Manchester Arena attack have resumed their search for a suitcase used by the bomber in the days and hours leading up to the atrocity.
Salman Abedi, the British-Libyan man who carried out the attack, was seen on CCTV wheeling a shiny blue case around Manchester in the days before he detonated his suicide bomb, killing himself and 22 others last year.
Officers from Greater Manchester police (GMP) spent 11 months searching a rubbish tip next to the M66 between Bury and Heywood in Greater Manchester, looking for the suitcase. They combed through 11,000 tonnes of rubbish, but failed to find the case and called the search off in May.
On Monday, GMP said officers were searching the site again as part of Operation Manteline, the investigation into the attack.
About 15 officers from the force’s tactical aid unit could be seen using sticks to search bushes surrounding the site, and a fenced area within the tip, according to the Manchester Evening News.
Guardian Today: the headlines, the analysis, the debate - sent direct to you
Read more
Five days after the attack on 22 May last year, DCS Russ Jackson from the north-west counter-terrorism unit appealed for information about the suitcase, which he stressed was not used in the attack.
He said Abedi, 22, was seen repeatedly visiting the Wilmslow Road area of Manchester with the case between 18 and 22 May last year.
Known locally as the Curry Mile, nowadays the district has many Middle Eastern restaurants and shisha bars, and is largely populated by students and recent immigrants. Police carried out raids on properties in the area, but no one was charged.
Jackson said: “We believe Abedi was in possession of this case in the days before the attack at Manchester Arena. I want to stress that this is a different item than the one he used in the attack. This image was taken from CCTV in the city centre on 22 May.
“We have no reason to believe the case and its contents contain anything dangerous, but would ask people to be cautious.”
SalmanAbediSuitcase.jpg
Description:
Alleged Manchester Arena Bomber Salman Abedi's Disappearing Blue Suitcase
So nervous is she and her poor daughter that she's now blocked me on Facebook.
Before she did, though, she shared these concerns with me which I'm now, after a lot of soul searching, making public to aid the investigation.
Her and her daughter clearly could be the key to overturning the lies told about that terror attack, for which Salman Abedi looks more and more like a patsy for.
She's clearly being TAUGHT by one means and another to KEEP HER MOUTH SHUT.
Her silence may well be putting her and her daughters in more danger from the real perpetrators of the terrorist attack.
The police in Manchester MUST interview and PROTECT her otherwise they may as well all go home!
Please make sure that media, police, intelligence and everybody who's job it is to expose the real Manchester killers looks after Dawn and that the attempt to isolate and threaten her FAILS!
Manchester Arena terror attack eyewitness Dawn Waddy wrote:
Hi xxxx
I'm afraid i really can't talk about this without breaking down
As you can imagine, I am really struggling with this experience, so is my daughter.
Especially today. [the first anniversary]
I will be more than happy to message you on here though.
If you want any questions answering please feel free to ask on here.
Dawn x
Do you have any idea what nationality the woman was Dawn?
Manchester Arena terror attack eyewitness Dawn Waddy wrote:
Well, she didnt have her face covered, or anything over her head, so I doubt whether she was a Muslim, but she definately wasnt british.
But for the security to say to my daughter "how would you like it if someone accused you of something just because you were a different colour"!
But like I reminded them, it isnt white people acting out these attacks and the way she fidgeted made us uneasy.
The Greater Manchester police have not been in touch since they paid me a visit in June [2017].
Whether they would let me know the outcome of whether she was involved I'm not sure, but ive heard nothing since.
They would know by now if she was involved because they had her seat number so could check her ticket details.
Sky news is itself highly suspect but...
"There was a suspicious woman"
A woman who witnessed the terror attack in the Manchester Arena has condemned the venue for a ‘lack of security’ surrounding the event.
The mother, who was with a friend and her daughter at the Ariana Grande concert, says their bags were not searched before they entered the venue and claims her report of a ‘suspicious’ woman was dismissed.
Her group became concerned by a woman sitting next to them who was ‘acting suspiciously’. They reported the woman to security, who did attend to further investigate, but the woman says that their concerns were ultimately dismissed.
She said: ‘We had somebody sat next to us. She looked very suspicious and was fidgeting all the time with her bag on the floor and she was by herself.
Woman speculates about 'suspicious behaviour' of concertgoer
‘She was looking in the direction of where the explosion actually happened all night. She was smirking to herself and we got suspicious. My friend who was sitting next to her said, “I don’t like this”‘.
Speaking with Sky News she revealed: ‘I told security who then informed higher security and they were up and down the stairs where she was, discreetly watching her. Nothing was done about it.
‘Later on, as the concert was going on, she was becoming more and more agitated, with her bag on the floor. I actually sat next to her and I nudged her arm intentionally to speak to her and said “Sorry about that – are you by yourself?” and she said “Yes” and spoke to me, but I didn’t understand her.’
Clearly distressed, the woman added: ‘Security did not listen to me.
‘Holly, my daughter, got very upset about things and went to security but then they asked her “How would you like it if someone accused you of this?’
Mother blasts lax security at Manchester Arena before bomb that killed 22
She claimed no one checked her bags (Picture: Sky News)
‘One to two minutes before the concert finished she disappeared and the explosion went off.’
The woman added to Sky: ‘The security was awful and they did nothing about it. There should have been more security. They never checked bags at all.’
'Big flash of light' concert go-er describes explosion
Speaking to Sky News, witness Kirstyn Pollard, who was at the concert with her nine-year-old daughter, said that their bags were not searched by security either. ‘We were late and that could have been why, but no, they didn’t search my bags,’ she said.
Another witness, Chris Pawley, told Fox News there was seemingly ‘no security whatsoever’.
He said: ‘I’ve been to concerts before and sometimes you get patted down and empty your pockets. There was absolutely nothing at this concert tonight. We just literally got our tickets scanned and went straight in.’
The suicide bomber is thought to have detonated the bomb outside the arena, on the walkway between the venue and the station, in what experts have called a ‘security soft spot‘.
It has now been confirmed that 22 people died and 59 people were injured. They are now being treated in eight hospitals across the Greater Manchester area.
Police have identified the suicide-bomber in the Manchester attack as Salman Abedi but they have yet to figure out how he was able to detonate a bomb in the rotunda area of the arena where families and teens were enjoying an Ariana Grande concert.
Since the explosion, witnesses have come forward telling local news stations that the arena security was very lax as they entered the venue. Many say the security guards were more interested in whether or not the attendees were carrying water bottles than checking bags for weapons.
Three weeks prior to the incident, a woman who was in attendance at an Ed Sheeran concert at the same arena voiced her concern on security measures on TripAdvisor. According to her comment, the arena security guards just scanned her ticket and let her in without having her pass through a medal detector or bag check.
Security experts believe that the lone wolf chose the weakest part of the stadium to attack: the exit. As people flooded out of the stadium area after Grande’s encore performance Abedi detonated a “very sophisticated device” that could be heard from inside the stadium and blocks away in neighborhoods surrounding the area.
Others who were at the stadium said they did not see security as they left the arena after the bomb exploded. The only instruction attendees had was from a voice coming over the loud speaker in the arena telling people to “take your time. No problems here.”
Since the explosion, security around the world has been beefed up. Arenas and venues in the United States, Norway and France have seen additional units deployed despite the fact there are no credible or specific threats to the areas. _________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
Injured father Martin Hibbert was was not moved from the foyer for almost an hour, and said a blanket was placed over his teenage daughter as if she were dead, although she was alive and survived her injuries.
“There are still no answers [about the wait for treatment],” he told the BBC. “What I get so angry about is if I had lost consciousness or had not managed to stay alive, or to sum up the energy to signal that she was still breathing, my daughter wouldn't be here with us now.
”Somebody made a decision not to allow people to come in. Paramedics that could have dealt with that situation better with the right equipment.”
Ruth Murrell, who was injured alongside her daughter Emily, said “things could have been different”.
The story of the response on the night was overall ‘overwhelmingly positive’ with police, paramedics, arena staff and the council praised for their incredible actions following the horrific events of May 22
BY JENNIFER WILLIAMS 22:23, 27 MAR 2018
Fire crews desperate to help victims of the Manchester Arena bombing were held back by their bosses for two hours amid mistakes that brought the service ‘to the brink of failure’.
While paramedics and armed police were on the scene of last May’s attack within ten minutes, the fire service was in ‘paralysis’, according to Lord Bob Kerslake’s report into the atrocity, published today.
Frustrated crews - many of whom had heard the blast from their city centre post - were instead sent away to a station in Beswick, three miles away, only to later be sent back into town again amid confusion.
Lord Kerslake’s review concludes the actions of then-chief officer Peter O’Reilly ‘played a key role’ in the delays, while concluding ‘poor communication and poor procedures’ within the service were more broadly at fault.
The review also finds that Vodafone, which holds the national Home Office contract for emergency post-disaster hotlines, experienced a ‘catastrophic’ technical failure on the night that meant no fully-functioning phone number could be set up for desperate people in search of information.
Some relatives were forced to drive around hospitals in search of loved ones instead.
His review also criticises Greater Manchester Police for a breakdown in communication with other agencies that saw key officers overloaded with responsibilities and the fire service struggling to get key updates.
Nevertheless the story of the response on the night was overall ‘overwhelmingly positive’, it finds.
The review praises GMP’s duty officer, who made a ‘life or death’ decision to keep first responders at the scene rather than evacuate in the face of a possible further attack.
It paints a picture of extraordinary heroism, including from British Transport Police, rail staff, arena security, paramedics and members of the public, who ran straight into danger despite not yet knowing whether the arena’s foyer was safe to enter.
And it depicts in detail the experiences of victims and families - many of whom spoke directly to the review about the painful hours, days and weeks that followed the atrocity, which claimed the lives of 22 people.
Their experiences include frustrations with delayed mental health treatment and press intrusion, set alongside praise for the way Manchester as a city rallied round in the bomb’s aftermath.
“The people of Manchester did a fantastic job of boosting the morale of those affected,” one relative told the review, “making us feel as though we were not alone.”
The report, set up by Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham in the wake of the bomb, seeks to identify both the strengths and weaknesses in how the disaster was tackled.
Here are the key findings on each aspect of the response to the Manchester Arena attack:
The fire service
The fire service liaison officer decided relocating crews from the city centre to Philips Park station was the safest option, in case a marauding terrorist proved to be on the loose(Image: Joel Goodman)
After months of speculation about its role in the attack’s response, Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue service is singled out for stinging criticism in the report.
It finds the service provided ‘no meaningful role in the response to the attack for nearly two hours’, despite usually attending incidents within little over five-and-a-half minutes.
As a result crews and control room staff felt ‘they had let down the people of Greater Manchester and other visitors to the city that night’, it says, adding that ‘a valuable resource was not available to assist on the scene’ because the service was ‘out of the loop’.
Following the bomb’s detonation at 10.31pm, the report finds communication between fire and police was patchy, with the fire service’s designated liaison officer - who lived 22 miles away - struggling to reach the police’s duty officer for key information about the situation on the ground.
As a result, the fire service liaison officer decided relocating crews from the city centre to Philips Park station in Beswick, three miles from the arena, was the safest option, in case a marauding terrorist proved to be on the loose.
However the review found that having failed to get through to GMP command on the phone, for reasons that were ‘obvious’ due to the unfolding situation, he did little else to find out the precise picture.
“The...liaison officer appears to have acted as though he had no other options available to him through which to gain situational awareness himself or for others to get it for him,” it finds.
Greater Manchester’s chief fire officer Peter O’Reilly
“It has been disappointing for the panel to learn that, in this instance, specialist ‘inter-agency liaison’ appeared to count for nothing other than telephoning the GMP force duty officer and when this failed, the whole GMFRS response to the scene was effectively brought to a point of paralysis, which was to last until 00:21hrs when pumps were finally deployed forward.”
Meanwhile then-county fire officer Peter O’Reilly - the most senior officer in the service - ‘played a key role in delaying opportunities’ to coordinate with other services, such as the police, finds the report.
He did not arrive at fire command in Swinton until nearly midnight, having chosen not to go to the joint ‘gold command’ unit set up for all agencies at police HQ, where senior ambulance, health, council and transport officials had all gathered.
Asked why that was the case, he told the panel that his previous experience suggested gold command to be ‘chaos’.
But the review remains unconvinced, finding his reasons ‘insufficient’.
It finds the behaviour of senior officers ‘surprising’ and concludes that, when combined, the lack of their understanding of events on the ground - combined with the failure to deploy crews - demonstrates ‘an organisation brought to the point of failure by a reversion, under pressure, to a state of single-agency thinking’.
“It is the panel’s belief that this was underpinned by the service’s culture,” it adds, later adding that it must review the way it works with other agencies.
The chief fire officer eventually took direct control of deploying crews just as his colleagues - now on the ground - were starting to get a grasp of the situation and were about to order in the brigade’s ‘special response teams’, firefighters trained and equipped to deal with terrorist attacks.
But this was stopped by the chief, who held them back and instead ordered three regular pumps to move to the scene.
“This order caused the special response teams considerable concern,” says the report.
It adds: “The panel believes that the chief fire officer was frustrated that he had not been informed about the incident earlier by North West Fire Control. This led him to believe that he should intervene with tactical decision making at this point.”
When the regular crews finally arrived at the arena, nearly two hours after the blast, they suffered a further delay entering the building itself - because the officer on the ground now had to await the chief officer’s permission for them to go in.
Officials from other blue-light services ‘could see the immense frustration on the firefighters’ faces at their still being restrained from helping the other responders, who were clearly visible to them all treating the casualties within the station building’, it adds.
Crews eventually entered the arena two hours and six minutes after the bomb went off.
The report makes more than a dozen recommendations to the fire service, including around the role of liaison officers and joint working with other agencies.
At the time of writing Mr O’Reilly, who took early retirement last month, had not yet been contacted for comment.
The review however said it could make 'no comment' on whether the presence of fire crews at the scene earlier on the night 'would have affected any casualty's 'survivability', saying it would be a matter for a coroner at inquest.
Inquest hearings have been adjourned until June. But the report said that had fire crews been deployed to rendezvous points 'at the earliest opportunity', the evacuation of casualties 'could have been achieved more efficiently and possibly more rapidly'. The report only focused on the response to the attack in the nine days that followed.
The police
Greater Manchester Police are praised for deploying armed officers to the scene ‘remarkably fast’, with the first arriving within ten minutes.
With little concrete information available in the early stages of the attack about further threats, the force duty officer - the inspector in charge of initially coordinating the response - had to make a judgement call as to whether first responders should stay in the foyer helping casualties.
In the end he made a ‘life or death’ decision to keep them there.
“The force duty officer decided that to tell these responders to evacuate would have been unconscionable,” says the report, adding that it fully supports the decision.
Shortly after the attack GMP were also dealing with the lockdown of Piccadilly Station amid fears of a further atrocity, a suspicious package at North Manchester General Hospital, a possible gunman on the loose at the cathedral and the lockdown of the National Football Museum following an addition security alert.
The report finds that both the force duty officer and gold command - the officer in charge of strategic decisions on the night - were having to juggle too much, however, leaving too much hinging on a couple of individuals.
That led to a ‘shortfall’ in communication with other agencies such as the fire service over whether or not there was a continued terror threat, leading to ‘confusion’ - meaning a ‘critical’ opportunity to share vital information was lost.
It also concludes that police IT systems nationally need updating, since GMP could not electronically track the whereabouts of officers from other forces brought in as part of the immediate emergency response.
But ‘selfless willingness’ of police officers on the ground, along with ambulance staff, British Transport Police, and arena staff, meant the lack of fire service attendance did not throw the situation into chaos, it finds.
The report also heaps praise on GMP’s family liaison officers, the key point of contact for families in the aftermath of the attack.
Described as a ‘vital source of support and comfort to many of the families which went well beyond their formal roles’, the review says it heard many examples of how the officers helped the shocked and bereaved.
“This is just one example of the way in which families were put first by the different agencies involved in responding to the attack,” it says.
The ambulance service
Paramedics outside Manchester Arena(Image: Getty Images Europe)
The first advanced paramedic was inside the arena within 11 minutes - and on learning that the incident was a ‘suicide bomber’, walked straight up the stairs from the concourse and into the foyer, where he started triaging casualties.
In the immediate aftermath two technicians also went into the foyer without bulletproof vests, ‘despite the fact it hadn’t been declared safe’, says the report.
Advertising placards, metal poles and other improvised bits and pieces were then used to carry the wounded out of the arena foyer and onto the concourse.
“At this time, there were no stretchers available, so the responders rapidly improvised by using display boards and metal crowd barriers to carry the injured,” says the report, adding that witnesses were ‘amazed’ at the speed of the teamwork.
Once ambulance crews arrived, the ranking officer on the ground took the ‘pragmatic’ decision to allow the makeshift evacuation to continue into the station, so that casualties could be safely treated by crews on the concourse, away from any potential emerging threat.
While the review finds this was the correct decision, it says many who contributed to the review expressed their concerns.
However it finds the initial decision was based on ‘clear and logical reasoning’ by the advanced paramedic, who felt the foyer was dangerous, while the presence of armed police would mean ‘the process would be made more difficult for ambulance crews to come up and take away the casualties according to priority’.
“The panel understands that this perception of delay was frustrating and disorientating for the injured and other members of the public that were there,” it concludes.
“However, the pause that was introduced by the period of casualty stabilisation in the casualty clearing station actually gave the receiving hospitals the vital time they needed to clear and prepare operating theatres and to assemble operating teams.
“In addition, the casualty clearing station provided a place for essential triage to take place to ensure the best possible onwards care, and provide the means for the most effective utilisation of NWAS resources (ambulance staff) for onward dispersal of patients in the most challenging circumstances.
“Importantly, it ensured that casualties went to the hospital with the most appropriate specialists and facilities to treat their specific injuries.”
Concluding, it suggests key venues should have easy-to-use stretcher equipment that can be used in the aftermath of a major disaster when casualties need to be removed from a scene fast.
“All major transport hubs and public venues should possess and provide immediate access to basic frameless canvas stretchers to enable rapid movement and evacuation of casualties during terrorist attacks,” it says.
Emergency services should also look at making such equipment readily available to staff, it adds.
It also notes the lack of the fire service’s special response crews - who had specific stretchers designed to evacuate from disaster zones fast.
By the time the fire service arrived all casualties had been evacuated, it says, but adds: “It is important here to repeat, however, that the panel can make no comment on whether the presence of GMFRS crews earlier on the night would have affected any casualty’s survivability.”
The British Transport Police, Northern Rail and arena staff
First on the scene, dozens of security and transport workers also bravely rushed into danger.
Four officers from British Transport Police were first to get to the foyer, arriving within 30 seconds.
Praised as being among the ‘unsung heroes’ of the atrocity, the report says BTP took one young casualty to hospital themselves amid concerns for her life.
“The panel was impressed to hear of the way in which these officers immediately started to manage the scene and assist arena staff and members of the public in treating casualties before further assistance arrived,” it says.
Officers then helped with the makeshift stretchering of victims in a ‘seamless’ joint operation with GMP, despite fears that there may be another bomber on the loose.
Rail employees leapt to help, too.
“Immediately on hearing the detonation, fifteen Northern staff ran to the site of the explosion from Victoria train station,” it adds.
“These staff were not medically qualified staff but had received standard first aid at work training.
“Normal working procedure is for staff to evacuate and stay safe but this was not followed on the night. “Once the magnitude of the event was conveyed by the staff in the foyer area to their control room, more staff were sent with additional medical supplies.
“The staff were asked to leave for their own safety by police officers but they refused, choosing to stay with the casualties.”
Despite not knowing whether the foyer was safe, more than a dozen first aiders working from security firm Showsec also joined.
One family member described the arena’s security staff as forming ‘a human wall to stop people going before the smoke’.
The emergency hotline
The report finds a government contract with Vodafone, intended to provide emergency public hotlines in disaster situations, resulted in ‘complete’ and ‘catastrophic failure’.
One of the firm’s servers failed on the night, meaning police were unable to set up the 0800 number they had planned for people seeking information on loved ones.
An 0161 number was eventually installed by 3am, but was unable to handle the volume of calls a specialist hotline would normally case.
“This failure was a cause of significant stress and upset on the night to the families involved, who were seeking to find out more about the situation of their loved ones,” it says.
“A number were reduced to a frantic search around the hospitals of Greater Manchester to find out more.”
The report reveals the human impact of the failure, which it also says staff at the firm - and its sub-contractor Content Guru - had ‘little knowledge’ of the police’s needs through the contract.
Vodafone’s chief executive has since apologised for the failure and promised it will not happen again.
But the review reveals the human impact of such technological failures on those desperately seeking information on May 22 and 23.
“The family called the helpline seven times and were given seven different reference numbers,” according to one account.
“The helpline contacted me the following afternoon to ask if X had been found but offered no other help,” describes another relative.
Vodafone has held the national contract for the service since 2009 and the report recommends the Home Office ‘urgently secure appropriate guarantees from Vodafone that the necessary fall-back and disaster recovery arrangements are in place to address the failures’.
The council and the mayor
The report says the civic response of the city-region 'was by any measure exceptional'(Image: PA)
The report praises the response of Manchester council and the mayor’s office in providing both civic leadership and specific support in the aftermath.
“The civic response of the city-region was by any measure exceptional and demonstrated the enormous strength of the civic leadership and partnership in Greater Manchester.
“The early press conference by the leader of Manchester city council and the Mayor of Greater Manchester, through to the vigil attended by thousands in front of the town hall, stands testament to the determination that Greater Manchester would stay open for business.
“The strength of the civic leadership had a profound impact on how events played out in the subsequent days following the attack.”
Councillors and town hall officers got involved early and everything kicked in smoothly, adds the report.
Council leader Sir Richard Leese told the panel he was clear the Greater Manchester Run should go ahead as usual the following weekend.
“The council leader told the panel of his experience visiting a deserted Paris two weeks after the terrorist attack in that city and his determination that the run should go ahead to provide the message that Manchester was open for business,” says the review.
Families also praised the centre set up by the council at the Etihad in the early hours of the following morning, where people could gather while awaiting news of relatives and loved ones.
“The arrangements at the Etihad were excellent … it couldn’t have been handled better,” said one family member.
“It all clicked together … blankets, chargers, paracetamol … everything you could need,” said another.
The town hall also carefully and ‘sensitively’ removed all the flowers from Albert Square to St Ann’s Square, says the review, which praises its ‘highly effective leadership’, including on the We Love Manchester fundraising campaign.
The press
The Manchester Evening News is praised for responsible reporting and its role in raising millions for the We Love Manchester Fund
Many families reported feeling ‘hounded’ by the media during the hours and days that followed the attack, although the Manchester Evening News is singled out for praise by the report.
The review panel describes itself as ‘shocked and dismayed’ by the level of press intrusion in some cases, with one family member describing how a picture was taken of them receiving news of their bereavement through a window.
“At the hospitals, families attending to look for missing loved ones and visiting the injured described having to force their way through scrums of reporters who ‘wouldn’t take no for an answer’,” says the review.
“One mother, who was herself seriously injured as was her daughter, spoke of the press ringing her on her mobile whilst she was recovering in hospital.
“A member of staff on her ward spoke of a note offering £2,000 for information being included in a tin of biscuits given to the staff.”
Police officers in St Ann's Square(Image: PA)
Another relative describes a reporter ‘ramming a foot in the doorway’ of their home, while the review cites two reported examples of impersonation - one suspected journalist pretending to be a bereavement nurse and the second, a police officer.
The Manchester Evening News is praised for responsible reporting and its role in raising millions for the We Love Manchester Fund.
“The information in the Manchester Evening News was correct but when national press picked it up it would change,” said one family member, while another described their local press as ‘amazing’.
“A number of families spoke in praise of sympathetic reporting by the Manchester Evening News and other papers local to the bereaved,” says the report.
The review makes a number of recommendations in relation to the media, including that the Independent Press Standards Organisation - the press regulator - introduce new guidelines on reporting the aftermath of terror attacks.
The health service
Families interviewed for the review were full of praise for hospitals involved in scrambling to treat victims on the night.
In some cases as doctors and nurses rushed to set up emergency procedures some parties ‘already got to leave of their own volition’ having heard the news.
“The NHS staff were amazing … genuinely cared for and supported … nurses held my hand during flashbacks,” said one concertgoer.
“Medical teams were waiting to assess and treat people as they arrived … medical staff updated us every fifteen minutes on his progress,” added a family member.
But numerous families felt a lack of mental health support was made available, particularly for children and young people.
“Respondents identified services for children and young people as being particularly hard to access, with waiting lists of several months, says the report, citing one example of a young woman who faced an eight-month wait for post traumatic stress disorder counselling.
“The response from schools varied, with some respondents stating that their children had been supported well at school with specialist psychological provision, whilst others described how the school had failed to recognise the child’s trauma.”
The local ‘resilience hub’, which was intended to coordinate their care, comes in for praise - but many people still felt they were waiting too long for support.
“My place of work paid for private counselling sessions,” said one victim.
“I was a mess and did not stop crying for the first three sessions. I have not been in work since the attack. I spend most of my time talking to a war veteran who gives me support.”
The report recommends future emergency planning for major incidents should include proper mental health provision for both children and adults.
Manchester
Manchester emerges from the report as a city that rallied round its grieving and wounded, including through the We Love Manchester fund and One Love concert.
The review itself describes just how quickly the community mobilised, adding: “The day following the attack saw hundreds queuing in Manchester to donate blood.
“Hospitals and police maintaining the cordon received many donations of food from private individuals, community groups and local businesses.”
For bereaved families and victims themselves, the city is described as a source of strength.
“The response from the city of Manchester and its people was incredible,” said one family member interviewed by the panel.
“I loved the community spirit of Manchester, how they all came together in defiance and raised money all from good will,” said another.
The One Love Manchester concert at Old Trafford(Image: PA)
“Whoever we spoke to, we felt as though we were being listened to, that they made sure they had time for us. You could tell that they cared,” said a third.
The report repeatedly highlights the ‘selfless’ acts of Mancunians who rushed to help people in their hour of need, either in the immediate aftermath or the days that followed, including through the vigil on May 23.
“I feel that the vigil, poem and benefit concert showed a lot of support and community spirit, made it seem like people did care about what happened,” said another contributor.
And one parent told how taking their daughter to the One Love gig helped her deal with PTSD symptoms and was ‘one of the most overwhelming and uplifting experiences of my life’, adding: “My daughter now considers Manchester her spiritual home, her favourite place.” _________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Mon Jun 25, 2018 11:41 pm Post subject:
False Flag terror attack characteristics
- Help lines inoperative/give no useful info.
- False alarm of 'second terrorist' giving police and private security total control of terror attack crime scene
- Key eyewitnesses not interviewed, frozen out or neglected
- Private security ineffective, ignore warnings, terror vector
- Suspect(s) reported to terror hotline, well known to MI5
- No CCTV footage of suspect at the scene
BCfm presenter and former BBC producer Tony Gosling joins Richie to talk about the many unanswered questions about last years Manchester Arena bombing. Tony also reflects on Article 13 being passed by the European Union last week. While it's not yet law, it has profound implications for the freedom of the internet and the independent media.
https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/richieallen/episodes/2018-06-25T13_ 09_42-07_00
Manchester Arena Bombing: Six False Flag Terror Attack Characteristics, Salman Abedi patsy?
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2018 11:09 pm Post subject:
Act of betrayal: rescued by the Royal Navy from Libyan warzone and evacuated back to Britain - three years before he slaughtered 22 people at a pop concert
Both Salman Abedi and his brother were rescued from Libya by the Royal Navy
The HMS Enterprise took Abedi to Malta before he headed back home to Britain
He was on a gap year from Manchester College when he was saved by the ship
Abedi’s younger brother Hashem is in jail in Tripoli facing trial over the attack
By LARISA BROWN IN TRIPOLI, LIBYA FOR DAILY MAIL
PUBLISHED: 22:30, 30 July 2018 | UPDATED: 23:56, 30 July 2018
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6008369/Manchester-bomber-resc ued-Royal-Navy-Libyan-warzone-evacuated-Britain.html
The Manchester suicide bomber was rescued by the Navy from war-torn Libya three years before his pop concert atrocity, the Mail reveals today.
HMS Enterprise plucked Salman Abedi, then 19, from the Libyan coast and took him to Malta for a flight home to Britain in August 2014.
Last May he set off a bomb in Manchester Arena that killed 22, including seven children. Abedi’s younger brother, Hashem, who is in jail in Tripoli facing trial over the attack, was also rescued by HMS Enterprise. The pair had been caught up in fighting in Libya and were among more than 100 British citizens taken to safety. Photographs released by Ministry of Defence officials at the time showed the group being brought on board the Navy vessel.
A Whitehall source said: ‘For this man to have committed such an atrocity on UK soil after we rescued him from Libya was an act of utter betrayal.’ The revelation will enrage families who lost loved ones in Abedi’s despicable attack.
It is also likely to raise fresh fears over possible intelligence failures.
Abedi was known to the security services and was being monitored at the time of his trip to Libya. However, just one month prior to his rescue, MI5 closed his case as a result of mistaken identity. The presence of the Abedi brothers among the 110 evacuees from Libya in 2014 was confirmed by family friends in Libya. One said: ‘They were sent together by the Royal Navy to Malta.’
RELATED ARTICLES
Previous
1
Next
Parents' fury at 'daylight robbery' fairytale-themed event...
Russian police RE-ARREST four members of Pussy Riot just...
SHARE THIS ARTICLE
Share
Sources in London also confirmed Salman was on HMS Enterprise.
After being dropped off in Malta, Salman and his 21-year-old brother – the British-born sons of Libyan migrants – flew back to Manchester where they were living at the time.
Salman, who was on a gap year from Manchester College, went on to study business management at Salford University, before dropping out and descending into a fanatical spiral that culminated in last year’s suicide bombing at the age of 22.
British survey ship HMS Enterprise evacuated more than 100 British citizens from Libya in August 2014 +7
British survey ship HMS Enterprise evacuated more than 100 British citizens from Libya in August 2014
The Abedi brothers shuttled back and forth between Manchester and Tripoli because their parents – Ramadan and Samia – had returned to Libya.
Ramadan is thought to have gone back in time for the 2011 revolution, allegedly fighting against the Gaddafi regime with the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group.
It is not certain whether the two brothers were with their father at the time of the revolution or instead in neighbouring Tunisia.
But they were on holiday in Libya in August 2014 when civil war fighting broke out and British officials offered to evacuate UK citizens.
The Royal Navy was tasked with picking them up, along with other British nationals, on a list provided to sailors.
The presence of the Abedi brothers among the 110 evacuees from Libya in 2014 was confirmed by family friends in Libya +7
The presence of the Abedi brothers among the 110 evacuees from Libya in 2014 was confirmed by family friends in Libya
By that time, the Foreign Office had already changed its official travel advice to warn Britons in Libya to ‘leave immediately by commercial means’ because of the fighting around Tripoli and the wider instability nationwide.
The advice said those unable to leave independently could seek ‘assisted departure’.
Senior security sources stressed they did not believe Abedi had been radicalised at the time of the Royal Navy rescue. He later became brainwashed after watching bomb-making videos on Google-owned YouTube and terror material on other internet sites, they believe.
A senior source told the Mail: ‘He was a British citizen so it was our job to safeguard him. Salman was one of many people in that mix and we absolutely had to evacuate him.
‘He was not a threat at the time and it was in a very different context.’
Other sources have claimed Abedi was on the front line and was hospitalised fighting alongside jihadis in Ajdabiya, eastern Libya.
Abedi was on a gap year from Manchester College and he later went on to study business management at Salford University +7
Abedi was on a gap year from Manchester College and he later went on to study business management at Salford University
However, a family friend was adamant that Abedi was there for innocent purposes. The friend said: ‘Salman and Hashem were not involved in fighting at all and they had spent a lot of time with their mother in Tunisia.’
At the time of the rescue, there were increasingly brutal battles between various militia groups fighting for control of Tripoli’s airport and dozens were killed.
As a result the Foreign Office announced it was temporarily closing its embassy and other consular operations in Libya.
Amid fierce fighting UK citizens were taken in small boats from the port of Tripoli to HMS Enterprise, a survey ship on a routine deployment in the Mediterranean. There were joined by two Irish citizens and a German.
It is not known if the flights home to the UK were paid for by the British government.
A security source downplayed claims that Abedi was involved in fighting and said he could have just been visiting his family.
‘When they leave the UK it becomes a lot more challenging to keep track of them, especially when they have family links in other countries,’ said the insider.
‘But his visits were not necessarily for nefarious purposes. He did things largely alone. The internet played a large role when it came to his terror training.’
A security source downplayed claims that Abedi was involved in fighting and said he could have just been visiting his family when rescued from Libya +7
A security source downplayed claims that Abedi was involved in fighting and said he could have just been visiting his family when rescued from Libya
A report into the handling of the Manchester bombing by David Anderson QC revealed that Abedi was first actively investigated in January 2014 – seven months before the rescue.
Published in December last year, the report said he was investigated because it was ‘thought that he might have been an individual who had been seen acting suspiciously with a subject of interest’ to counter-terrorism police.
Abedi did know the suspect but turned out not to have been the individual seen with him and his record was closed in July 2014. He was classed as a low residual risk.
He came to the attention of the authorities again in October 2015 because of his supposed contact with an Islamic State figure in Libya.
The report found that this allegation was wrong and his file was closed once more.
Abedi attended Burnage Academy for Boys in Manchester between 2009 and 2011 before going to Manchester College until 2013. Two people who knew him from his college days claim they called an anti-terrorism hotline to warn police about his extremist views.
A community support worker, who did not wish to be named, told the BBC they had informed the authorities after Abedi publicly said ‘he was supporting terrorism’ and that ‘being a suicide bomber is OK’.
Greater Manchester Police found no record of the phone calls, however.
The Anderson review concluded that the investigative actions taken in relation to Abedi, and the subsequent decision to shut his file, were sound on the basis of the information available at the time.
At the time of the rescue in 2014, the MoD released a statement from HMS Enterprise’s commanding officer, Cdr Mark Varta, saying: ‘This is a period of uncertainty for UK citizens based in Libya but we have been proud to play our part in enabling their move to safety.’
The then defence secretary, Sir Michael Fallon, said: ‘I thank the crew of HMS Enterprise for their support and professionalism in carrying out this important task.’
The 90-metre-long survey ship, normally based in Plymouth, had been eight weeks into an 18-month mission carrying out surveys in the area.
Last night, a Government spokesman said: ‘During the deteriorating security situation in Libya in 2014, Border Force officials were deployed to assist with the evacuation of British nationals and their dependents.’
Now put bomber's brother on trial: Two brothers were saved by the Royal Navy from warzone. Today, one is dead after his devastating attack on Manchester — the other sits in a Libyan jail fighting to avoid justice
The Manchester bomber wasn’t the only member of his family to be rescued by the Royal Navy on that day in August 2014.
Salman Abedi’s brother Hashem was also picked up by brave servicemen – to return to Britain and play a key role in the atrocity carried out by Salman.
Hashem – alleged to have helped to buy materials for the Manchester bomb – is back in Libya, languishing in prison in Tripoli under a militia guard as the Libyan and British governments wrangle over his extradition to the UK.
He is being held by the Special Deterrence Force, also known as Rada, at a sprawling base at Mitiga airport. Discussions on bringing him back to Britain are believed to have stalled. When the brothers were rescued by the Navy, it was three years after Colonel Gaddafi had been ousted and Libya was again in the grip of outright warfare. 2014 marked the start of a particularly bloody conflict known as the second civil war.
Salman Abedi’s brother Hashem (pictured) is alleged to have helped to buy materials for the Manchester bomb +7
Salman Abedi’s brother Hashem (pictured) is alleged to have helped to buy materials for the Manchester bomb
Rival tribal groups fought bitterly for control of the country. Some were aligned with the ‘Libyan government’, elected democratically in June that year. Violently opposing was a hodgepodge of Islamist militias.
Amid the turmoil, the UK embassy in Tripoli was closed and the Ministry of Defence scrambled to evacuate British citizens stranded in the war zone.
But Salman was hardly some idle tourist caught up in the mayhem. Though born and bred in Britain, Abedi went on his school holidays to the war in Libya, where he may have learnt to kill as a 16-year-old.
While his Manchester classmates were embarking on A-levels, Abedi was taking up arms on a ‘gap year’ at the front line. The teenager had been taken to Libya by his father Ramadan Abedi to fight in the revolution.
Mr Abedi Snr was rejoicing in the 2011 uprising against Gaddafi. He had been an active opponent of the Libyan tyrant in the early 1990s, and when he was forced to flee the regime, he was given political refuge in Manchester where his second son Salman was born on New Year’s Eve 1994.
Friends said Salman Abedi grew up a typical teenager, supporting Manchester United and enjoying parties, drinking and smoking cannabis. He was teased with the nickname Dumbo at school for his big ears.
But when the revolution against Gaddafi erupted, his father seized the chance to take him back to his homeland to join the battle against the despot.
Mr Abedi had long been a prominent member of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), a militant organisation founded to pursue the violent overthrow of Gaddafi’s dictatorship and establish an Islamist state.
Many of its followers had waged jihad in Afghanistan against the Soviets, and in the late 1980s and early 1990s their aims overlapped significantly with British foreign policy. Britain had cut off diplomatic ties with Gaddafi’s regime after Pan Am Flight 103 was blown up over Lockerbie and policewoman Yvonne Fletcher was murdered in London.
It was even claimed – although denied – that MI6 encouraged a coup attempt in 1996 by the Islamist group.
Either way, by the early Nineties, many senior members of the LIFG were being pursued by Gaddafi and given sanctuary by Britain, with many settling in Manchester.
Among them was Mr Abedi, a one-time employee of Libya’s notorious secret police, who fled first to Saudi Arabia in 1991 and then to Britain a year later.
Mr Abedi and his wife Samia Tabbal – described as an incredibly bright nuclear engineer who graduated top of her class from Tripoli university – lived in the Whalley Range district of Manchester on the same street as another LIFG member, Abd al-Baset Azzouz, an expert bomb-maker.
But life for the LIFG veterans in Manchester started to get uncomfortable in 1999 when Tony Blair began the process of bringing Gaddafi in from the cold.
Diplomatic relations were resumed and sanctions were lifted. But in Manchester, the old LIFG warriors found their organisation designated as a terror group by the UN and the Home Office. Many of the Libyans living in Britain were placed under control orders.
Then came the Arab Spring in 2011, and Britain turned its back on Gaddafi once more.
David Cameron’s government sent warplanes to support the uprising against him. British-Libyans queued up to return home to join the fight. Ramadan Abedi swiftly signed up to the cause.
In the years that followed, Salman and Hashem, divided their time between Manchester and the war in Libya, using their British passports to travel freely between the two. Their parents relocated to Tripoli, effectively leaving the boys to look after themselves in the UK.
Salman quit Manchester College in 2013 with ‘anger management issues’ after punching a girl for wearing a short skirt and telling the head teacher there were ‘a lot of things going on’ with his family and ‘fighting in Libya’.
Friends said he was ‘slow and unintelligent’, a heavy cannabis user and increasingly violent to women. In 2014, he was back in Libya when full-blown war returned following the June parliamentary elections that squeezed the Islamist factions to a minority of seats.
Rather than accept the result, Islamist leaders accused the new parliament of being dominated by supporters of the dictator and battled the nationalist militia.
By August, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates were launching airstrikes against the Islamists who had seized control of Tripoli airport. To make matters even more chaotic, fanatics from the Islamic State group were establishing a stronghold in coastal areas, broadcasting gruesome videos of their self-proclaimed warriors beheading captured Christians.
It was around this time that the Royal Navy ship was dispatched to help Britons make their escape from the hellish situation. Salman and Hashem – who had been spending the summer in Tripoli with their family – took their chance to join the evacuation.Back in Manchester, Abedi enrolled at Salford University, collecting about £7,000 from the taxpayer-funded Student Loans Company. He pocketed the money and dropped out.
By now Salman – who was chanting in the streets and putting the bins out wearing Islamic robes – had become fully radicalised.
He used the taxpayers’ cash to help bankroll his terror plot, travelling to and from Libya where he became increasingly battle hardened. Then on May 22 last year, he took his explosives-packed rucksack bearing a logo of the Union Flag and wrought terrible carnage on the country that gave his parents safe haven and rescued him from a war zone.
Hashem, 21, was arrested in a remote farmhouse outside the Libyan capital a day after the suicide bombing in May last year.
The British government requested in October last year that he be extradited to face trial over the massacre. He is separately facing allegations that he was part of a plot to kill a British ambassador in Libya. Hashem is held is in a prison section specifically for IS suspects, of which there are around 250. His father Ramadan, was also detained outside his home in a Tripoli suburb but later released.
British police believe Hashem helped his brother buy the materials to build the bomb detonated at Manchester Arena. He has also been linked to a suicide plot to kill Peter Millett, the UK’s envoy to Libya. But in May this year senior Libyan sources told the Mail that Hashem could escape UK justice by refusing to face trial here.
Killer’s vile thank you – a nail bomb he set off among happy families
Salman Abedi waited until he was surrounded by happy families before detonating his bomb.
Metal nuts and bolts packed into his rucksack tore through his victims, many of them teenage girls. Seven of the 22 dead were children.
Abedi, 22, blew himself up in the foyer of Manchester Arena at 10.31pm last May 22, just as tired-but-happy teenage fans were leaving after the performance by American singer Ariana Grande.
On September 15, 2011, David Cameron triumphantly entered Liberation Square in the Libyan city of Benghazi to milk every last ounce of publicity for Britain's role in the downfall of President Gaddafi.
In a hubristic speech to cheering Libyans, he told his carefully chosen audience how it was 'great to be in free Libya. Colonel Gaddafi said he would hunt you down like rats, but you showed the courage of lions'.
Six years later, a very different scene was played out in another city centre square hundreds of miles to the north.
Why on earth was this callous terrorist allowed to come to Britain? Did British intelligence check his motivations and his allegiances? +2
Why on earth was this callous terrorist allowed to come to Britain? Did British intelligence check his motivations and his allegiances?
Once again, there was a large crowd, but this time they stood in silence. They had gathered in Manchester's Albert Square to pay tribute to those who died in the pop concert bombing which cost 22 lives when Salman Abedi blew himself up among scores of children.
Until recently, there seemed no solid reason to link the awful carnage in Manchester with David Cameron's vainglorious intervention.
Today, it is possible to discern a direct and irrefutable connection. Thanks to Mail reporter Larisa Brown, the world now knows that the Royal Navy rescued the Manchester killer, then just 19 years old, from Libya three years before the Manchester atrocity occurred and ferried him back to this country.
Of course, hindsight is always a wonderful thing. But vital questions scream to be asked if such an atrocity is to be prevented in the future.
Why on earth was this callous terrorist allowed to come to Britain? Did British intelligence check his motivations and his allegiances? Were investigations made to see whether he had any history of training in Libya with jihadi groups?
Most important of all, why didn't the Ministry of Defence reveal the Navy's role in the Abedi story, which, so I reliably understand, has been an open secret in Whitehall for months.
Their failure to come clean is a grotesque insult to the families of the dead in Manchester, who are surely entitled to be told why their loved ones were taken from them in the most brutal fashion.
This sordid business once again shines a pitiless light on the culture of secrecy in Whitehall, where obstructive civil servants routinely treat the public like idiots.
ET TU, BORIS?
Polls now confirm my report last week that Boris Johnson has emerged as leader of the Brexiteer Tories.
So when will he strike at the Prime Minister?
Expect the former foreign secretary to wait until the eve of Tory Conference, when he will set out his own vision of Brexit.
Mr Johnson will not move in for the kill, however, until late autumn.
And only if Theresa May persists with the Chequers deal.
It is only days since we learned that Home Secretary Sajid Javid secretly dispatched two former British citizens — members of Islamic State's so-called quartet of 'Beatles' — into the jurisdiction of the United States and the real possibility of the death penalty, without informing Parliament or the British public.
And it's only a few months since the Intelligence and Security Committee report into British complicity with torture in the New Labour years exposed a culture of lying and underhand action inside the British Intelligence services and among ministers.
Nor did Tony Blair ever own up to the links between the London bombings of July 2005 which claimed 52 innocent lives and the Iraq war two years earlier which had motivated so many angry young Muslim men to seek revenge on the West. I am afraid that lurking behind this insidious culture of secrecy is an even bigger question, one which has rarely been asked before.
Did the bombing in Manchester Arena last year represent terrorist 'blowback' from David Cameron's intervention in Libya, which was taken against the advice of his senior generals?
For the fall of the Gaddafi regime created a power vacuum in Libya and allowed armed jihadi groups to flourish. Remember that back in 2011, Britain played an important role in the aerial bombing campaign that helped weaken Muammar Gaddafi.
But the terms of the United Nations resolution which authorised the British and French intervention specifically prohibited us from sending in ground troops.
Instead — invoking the old mantra that my enemy's enemy is my friend — Britain threw its weight behind jihadi fighters who bore an ancient grudge against the Libyan leader.
Family home in Libya where Salman Abedi plotted Manchester attack
Protests held as Northamptonshire County …
Barry George admits mixed feelings about being releas…
'Europe has months to tackle migrant crisis': EU council h…
Damian Hinds refuses to confirm interest rate reviews
Among these militant groups was a body called the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, known for its links to Al Qaeda. Indeed, in 1996 Britain had secretly supported the LIFG in a bid to assassinate Gaddafi.
So the impression is that groups connected to Al Qaeda were effectively Britain's 'boots on the ground' in the war against Gaddafi. Crucially, Ramadan Abedi, father of the Manchester bomber, was a member of this same Libyan international fighting group. Salman Abedi may have fought with them, too.
Many people will find it frankly incredible that Britain was linked to fighters who had vowed to wage war and destruction against the West. Yet this is something that has happened in a number of foreign conflicts.
In the Eighties, Britain and America formed an alliance with radical jihadis — including Osama bin Laden — in Afghanistan in order to defeat Soviet forces after the communist invasion.
More recently, Britain allied itself with Islamist militias affiliated to Al Qaeda after we chose to take sides against President Bashar al-Assad in the Syrian civil war. As we now know, the Manchester bomber Salman Abedi was linked to such a network of fighting jihadis through his father.
My guess is that this week's news about the role of the Royal Navy in bringing him to this country is the first in a series of revelations to come about the links between the British state and the Manchester bomber.
Last week, a solicitor representing victims of the Manchester Arena bombing remarked that 'I am sure the security services have not told us the full story. We may need an inquiry to get to the truth'. I agree with him.
Of course, only one man bears the full responsibility for the terrible atrocity which struck Manchester just over a year ago. That is Salman Abedi himself.
But his hideous actions did not come out of a vacuum. We need to get the full truth about the role of the British state in Libya, how Abedi was allowed to return to Britain — and why he was effectively left to his own devices until he carried out his monstrous attack. The families of those who were killed deserve nothing less.
Censorship and the hypocrisy of Google
Internet giant Google is notorious for fostering a culture in which anything goes. You need only to look at some of the horrors that are allowed to fester on its YouTube video subsidiary to see that where there are profits to be made, its morals are entirely elastic.
Now we learn that Google has been in talks with China, where novelists like George Orwell are banned and no mention of the Tiananmen Square atrocity is even allowed (stock image) +2
Now we learn that Google has been in talks with China, where novelists like George Orwell are banned and no mention of the Tiananmen Square atrocity is even allowed (stock image)
Until now, this has been seen as an expression of the group's free-wheeling libertarian philosophy and its Californian origins. Yet there's an even bigger driving force behind Google: naked greed. Nothing else can explain the disquieting news that this giant technology firm — which will allow virtually anything online in the West — may accept censorship of its search engine in order to break into the Chinese market.
Back in 2010, Google pulled out of China citing fears about censorship and surveillance. The company's co-founder Sergey Brin, who was brought up under Soviet rule, expresses his hatred of the 'forces of totalitarianism'. Since then, the forces of oppression inside China have got far worse. Yet now we learn that Google has been in talks with China, where novelists like George Orwell are banned and no mention of the Tiananmen Square atrocity is even allowed.
The suggestion is that Google will accept censorship in exchange for potentially massive profits. Google claims to follow the philosophy 'don't be evil'.
By Rhian Lubin
18:11, 24 MAY 2017
UPDATED 09:03, 25 MAY 2017
The father of suspected Manchester terror attack 'suicide bomber' Salman Abedi has been whisked away by MASKED MEN during a TV interview.
Ramadan Abedi was reportedly detained while recording television interviews in Libya, according to ITV News.
It was later confirmed he was arrested in the Libyan capital Tripoli by counter-terrorism force according to a spokesman.
The counter-terrorism force detained Ramadan Abedi outside his home in the Tripoli suburb of Ayn Zara on Wednesday afternoon.
An eyewitness said he was handcuffed by armed men who drove him away in two unmarked vehicles.
The development also came just hours after Hashem's father broke his silence this afternoon to insist his other son, Salman, was innocent.
Ramadan Abedi told Bloomberg: “I was really shocked when I saw the news, I still don’t believe it.
Suicide bomber Salman Abedi (Image: Internet Unknown)
“As we were discussing news of similar attacks earlier, he was always against those attacks, saying there’s no religious justification for them.
"I don’t understand how he’d have become involved in an attack that led to the killing of children.
“Every father knows his son and his thoughts, my son does not have extremist thoughts.”
The younger brother of Salman Abedi was also arrested during a separate raid in Libya on suspicion of Islamic State links today.
Reuters reports that Salman's brother Hashem Abedi, who was born in 1997, has also been arrested in Tripoli on suspicion of links with Islamic State, a spokesman for a local counter-terrorism force said on Wednesday.
The force, known as Rada, detained him on Tuesday evening, spokesman Ahmed Bin Salem told Reuters.
Salman Abedi killed 22 people in the bombing at Manchester Arena in May 2017
MPs reviewing the 2017 terror attacks say MI5 has accepted it made a mistake in not tracking the Manchester bomber.
A report by the Intelligence and Security Committee said MI5 recognised it had moved "too slowly" to establish how dangerous Salman Abedi, 22, was.
The security service had cause to monitor Abedi's return to the UK from Libya days before the attack in which 22 people died, the report said.
Martin Hibbert, injured in the blast, said the truth was now coming out.
And Dan Hett, from Survivors Against Terror - who lost his brother Martyn in the attack - said the "litany of mistakes in 2017 must urgently be learnt from".
In wide-ranging criticisms, the committee said the government had also failed to fully learn lessons from attacks dating back 13 years.
Abedi is believed to have been taught bomb-making while in Libya, before returning to Manchester in May last year to construct his device.
He walked into the foyer of Manchester Arena, where thousands had been watching US singer Ariana Grande perform, and blew himself up.
A previous report into the attack revealed that MI5 had planned to review the risks posed by Abedi - but the meeting was not scheduled to take place before the attack occurred.
The Manchester bomb attack changed my life
What we know about Manchester bomber
Who were the victims?
In its findings, the ISC said there had been "no follow-up action" after Abedi visited a jailed terrorist organiser from Manchester.
Last December, an independent assessment of MI5's own secret review of the attack revealed for the first time that an opportunity had been missed to monitor Abedi's movements - which would have revealed his return to the UK from Libya, days before he struck.
"MI5 have since admitted that given the information they had on Abedi, they should have done so," said the committee.
"Abedi had been flagged for review but MI5's systems moved too slowly."
Since then, MPs said the security service had already changed its systems in an attempt to better identify potential extremists like him.
The committee said one failing it had identified was so sensitive, it could not be shared publicly.
But it added: "What we can say is that there were a number of a failings in the handling of Salman Abedi's case.
"While it is impossible to say whether these would have prevented the devastating attack on 22 May, we have concluded that as a result of the failings, potential opportunities to prevent it were missed."
People look at flowers and tributes left in Manchester - a week after the terror attack took placeImage copyrightREUTERS
Image caption
Manchester was a city in mourning after the attack
Mr Hibbert, who was left paralysed by the explosion, welcomed the report's release. His daughter was also wounded as they left the arena when the bomb went off.
"It doesn't make things any easier but it means at last there is some compassion being shown and some accountability in terms of people saying 'We didn't do our job'.
"It's a start. It's just sad that it's taken 18 months," he said.
Another survivor, Robby Potter, who took his 11-year-old daughter Tegan to the concert, said he was considering taking legal action against MI5.
His injuries from 37 pieces of flying shrapnel have meant he's been unable to return to his job as a drainage engineer, and now drives lorries.
"I'd have more respect for them if they had said immediately after [the attack] 'we made a mistake - we underestimated this man'," he said.
"I love my country but I was let down. This could have been stopped, and we're finding out now that it should have been stopped."
In their highly-critical report, MPs and peers on the committee also found:
Measures to control access to chemicals needed for bomb-making were "hopelessly out of date"
Communication companies were still failing to meet their social duties to detect terror planning online - and it recommended putting pressure on them by targeting their profits
There had also been "fundamental failings" by the Home Office, police and Surrey County Council over their handling of the teenager who placed a bomb on the London Underground in September 2017
MI5 should rethink how it "joins the dots" on some suspects because it had failed to appreciate the potential dangers posed by Khalid Masood, the Westminster Bridge attacker, despite a trail of evidence over six years
The committee also attacked the Home Office for failing to properly co-operate over its attempts to investigate how the Parsons Green attacker, Ahmed Hassan, went undetected.
It had made "multiple attempts" to extract the "full evidence" from the Home Office - but the information had not been provided in time.
"This is unacceptable," said the committee. "From what we have seen to date there were fundamental failings in the handling of this case by the Home Office, the police and Surrey County Council.
"This litany of errors will require a separate comprehensive review to which the Home Office must be directly answerable."
Presentational grey line
Analysis: Intelligence on suspects is fragmentary
Salman Abedi was a "closed subject of interest" for MI5 - someone who had once been a cause of concern - but there had been an assessment on the available intelligence that he was not going to turn to violence.
That meant the 22-year-old went into a pool of 20,000 closed SOIs - people who are not under active investigation anymore.
What the review makes clear is that the system for triggering a rethink of individuals in that closed group was too slow to react to a changing picture - and the security service has acknowledged its processes didn't, on this occasion, deliver.
The big problem is that intelligence on suspects is fragmentary. A British-Libyan young man travelling to Libya is not the stuff of red alerts.
But his visit to a jailed recruiter and facilitator would have been a relevant piece of information for the review of Abedi that had been planned. That information hadn't reached MI5 before the attack.
And that's why the committee says there are really serious questions to be answered by all arms of government over whether everyone is learning lessons from every terrorism conspiracy of recent years.
Presentational grey line
The committee said that despite these concerns about government, it recognised that MI5 and the police had taken the mistakes seriously.
"We note that both MI5 and counter-terrorism policing have been thorough in their desire to learn from past mistakes," it said.
"We also know and acknowledge the determination with which they approach their work, which we regard as impressive.
"However, it has been striking how many of the issues which arose in relation to the 2017 terrorist attacks have been previously raised by this committee in our reports on the 7/7 attacks [in 2005] and on the killing of Fusilier Lee Rigby [in 2013].
"We have previously made recommendations in all these areas yet the government failed to act on them. The lessons of last year's tragic events must now result in real action."
Home Secretary Sajid Javid said: "We have updated our counter-terrorism strategy, introduced new legislation to allow threats to be disrupted earlier and have increased information-sharing with local authorities.
"We are also ensuring technology companies play their part by stopping terrorists from exploiting their platforms," he added.
Scotland Yard said the police and MI5 have foiled 13 plots since the Westminster attack in March 2017.
Assistant Commissioner Neil Basu, the head of counter-terrorism policing, said: "We will not let the terrorists who carried out these appalling attacks to succeed in scaring and dividing us."
The Met was, he said, doing more now to improve the handling and assessment of intelligence and making better use of data.
It is currently handling more than 700 live investigations, involving 3,000 people posing the biggest threat and another 20,000 who are also considered a concern.
Presentational grey line
Terror attacks in 2017
Counter-terrorism special forces officers at the scene in London BridgeImage copyrightGETTY IMAGES
22 March: Khalid Masood runs down and kills four people on Westminster Bridge before stabbing a policeman to death outside Parliament.
22 May: Salman Abedi, 22, detonates a home-made bomb in Manchester Arena's foyer blowing crowds off their feet as they leave an Ariana Grande concert. Twenty-two people die and more than 800 are injured.
3 June: Eight people are killed when three attackers drive a van into pedestrians on London Bridge and launch a knife attack in Borough Market.
19 June: Darren Osborne drives a van into worshippers near Finsbury Park Mosque, killing one man and injuring nine others.
15 September: Ahmed Hassan, 18, plants a home-made bomb on a Tube train at Parsons Green, which injures 51 people when it partially explodes. _________________ www.lawyerscommitteefor9-11inquiry.org www.rethink911.org www.patriotsquestion911.com www.actorsandartistsfor911truth.org www.mediafor911truth.org www.pilotsfor911truth.org www.mp911truth.org www.ae911truth.org www.rl911truth.org www.stj911.org www.v911t.org www.thisweek.org.uk www.abolishwar.org.uk www.elementary.org.uk www.radio4all.net/index.php/contributor/2149 http://utangente.free.fr/2003/media2003.pdf
"The maintenance of secrets acts like a psychic poison which alienates the possessor from the community" Carl Jung
https://37.220.108.147/members/www.bilderberg.org/phpBB2/
Joined: 11 Nov 2008 Posts: 558 Location: Lancashire
Posted: Fri Nov 30, 2018 11:40 am Post subject:
The bomber, Salman Ramadan Abedi, was a 22-year-old British Muslim of Libyan ancestry. He was born in Manchester on 31 December 1994 to a family of Libyan-born refugees who had settled in south Manchester after fleeing to the UK to escape the government of Muammar Gaddafi. He grew up in the Whalley Range area and lived in Fallowfield.
According to The Times, Abedi had been among a group of students who had accused a teacher of Islamophobia for criticising suicide bombing. Neighbours described the Abedi family as very traditional and “super religious”. Abedi, his elder brother, and, prior to 2011, his father, attended Didsbury Mosque. An imam at the mosque recalled that Abedi looked at him “with hate” after he preached against ISIS and Ansar al-Sharia in 2015.
Abedi attended Burnage Academy for Boys in Manchester between 2009 and 2011, before going to the Manchester College until 2013 and then Salford University in 2014.
He was known to British security services but was not regarded as a high risk according to MI5. A community worker told the BBC he had called a hotline five years before the bombing to warn police about Abedi’s views and members of Britain’s Libyan diaspora said they had “warned authorities for years” about Manchester’s Islamist radicalisation.
Abedi was allegedly reported to authorities about his extremism, by as many as five people, including community leaders and possibly family members.
Police in Manchester following the suicide bombing by Salman Abedi last year
ON Thursday we had the corporate media trumpeting the “breaking news” of a report by the Intelligence and Security Committee on the “failings” of MI5 regarding the Manchester bombing.
Chair Dominic Grieve gravely announced that “MI5 moved too slowly to establish the danger posed by the bomber, Salman Abedi” and that “MI5 decided not to place travel monitoring or travel restrictions on Abedi and this allowed him to return undetected to the United Kingdom.”
“Undetected?” That’s interesting. Because the truth is that the security services, far from being apathetic in this affair, were intimately involved in facilitating the travel of British Libyans and exiled Libyans based in Manchester to Libya in 2011, the year, you might remember, when our government was making huge efforts to rid that country of Muammar Gadaffi.
As an independent journalist who wrote about the Manchester bombing in June 2017, this characterisation of events leaves me sickened. A more cynical distortion of the state’s role in this affair would be hard to imagine, but the majority of the public will never know this thanks to the lies by omission of the “mainstream” media.
In May last year, I read the stunning Middle East Eye report, “Sorted” by MI5: How UK government sent British-Libyans to fight Gadaffi” which documents how the British government lifted control orders on Libyan exiles and British/Libyan residents affiliated with the proscribed terrorist group LIFG (Libyan Islamic Fighting Group) giving them back their passports “just as the UK’s war against Gadaffi intensified, with the UK, France and the US carrying out air strikes and deploying special forces soldiers in support of the rebels.”
Theresa May was home secretary at this time and was responsible for this travesty which amounted, as we tragically discovered, to a grave threat to the security of the British public.
On Thursday, Grieve asserted that “this [Manchester] could not have been predicted in any way at all … we saw nothing to suggest that anyone could possibly have predicted what [Abedi] was going to do.”
What planet is this man on? He is either aware of the truth and is lying or he is unaware of it, in which case he is not fit to carry out an investigation.
The Middle East Eye report carried an interview with Belal Younis, a British Libyan, who revealed how he was stopped by counter-terrorism officers on his return to Britain after a visit to Libya in 2011, “but after providing them with the name and phone number of the MI5 officer he had spoken to previously, and following a quick phone call to him, he was waved through. As he waited to board the plane, he said the same MI5 officer called him to tell him that he had ‘sorted it out.’
“The government didn’t put any obstacles in the way of people going to Libya,” he told Middle East Eye. “The majority who went from here were from Manchester.”
Previously, Younis told Middle East Eye, he had been asked by an MI5 officer: “Are you willing to go into battle?”
“While I took time to find an answer he turned and told me the British government have no problem with people fighting against Gadaffi.”
Another British Libyan told Middle East Eye that he was “shocked” that he was able to travel to Libya in 2011 shortly after his control order was lifted.
“I was allowed to go, no questions asked,” he says, going on to reveal that he met “several other British-Libyans in London who also had control orders lifted.”
This was the same time, as Middle East Eye reminds us, that Britain, the US and France were bombing Libya (death toll: 100,000 innocent people) and putting special forces on the ground in support of elements opposed to Gadaffi.
This source confirmed to Middle East Eye that “within days” of their control orders being lifted, British authorities returned their passports, adding: “These were old school LIFG guys, they [the British authorities] knew what they were doing.”
It’s not difficult to see why MI5 would be interested in effectively recruiting LIFG members for their Libya project.
In 1996 they carried out a failed assassination attempt against Gadaffi which was, according to MI5 whistleblower, David Shayler, funded by MI6, this being one of the reasons he left MI5, later explaining he was “physically sickened by the fact that MI6 wanted to sponsor Islamic extremists and carry out terrorism.”
He expanded: “I joined the service to stop terrorism and prevent the deaths of innocent people, not to get involved in these despicable and cowardly acts.
“I still cannot believe that the Prime Minister has refused to take my evidence or investigate this matter as this decision has sent out a clear message to the intelligence services that they can fund terrorism, conspire to murder people with impunity, and take enormous risks with our security.
“After all, would you give an individual you hardly know, who has admitted to connections with al-Qaida, an enormous sum to carry out a terrorist attack, when you know the group he is leading is opposed to the values of Western society? It is difficult to imagine a greater disregard and contempt for the lives and security of the British people.”
How tragically these words echo now. How terribly prescient they are in light of Manchester’s grief. And how illuminating they are regarding the unseen — and unreported — shameful programme of deep-state depravity carried out under the noses of those who have reported on MI5’s “failings” today.
Historian Mark Curtis is author of the book Secret Affairs, which documents, using declassified government files, the long collusion of the British state with radical Islam to advance its foreign policy aims.
Curtis is well placed to remark that “the culture of lying to and misleading the electorate is deeply embedded in British policy-making,” enabled by the elite’s “endemic contempt for the general population.” A contempt which means that, “Labour and Conservative governments have connived with militant groups … to control oil resources, overthrow governments and promote Britain's financial interests.”
This is the reality which the corporate media will never reveal. But is that because they are not aware of the facts? Sadly not. I emailed Jon Snow of Channel 4 News last year making sure to include all of the information above and asking him, as a leading journalist on what is widely considered to be our most radical news programme, “why have you chosen not to report this story?” His reply was short but not so sweet: “I’m sorry Alison … it’s been so hard to keep up. I will try to pursue this the moment i can take breath. best Jon” He didn’t.
And now his corporate media colleagues will report all this, as the regrettable “failure” by MI5 we are told it is by a team of MPs who have investigated it thoroughly on our behalf. It’s all OK. Grieve assured us that “MI5 have revised their policies” and that “improvements are planned.”
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Mon Sep 09, 2019 12:35 am Post subject:
Priti Patel calls for Manchester Arena bombing coroner to keep intelligence material secret from public - as families say they fear a cover-up
Inquests in bombing victims' death are scheduled to begin on 2 April next year
Ahead of hearings, the government have applied to keep some evidence secret
Victims' families say the move could allow authorities to swerve scrutiny
By DUNCAN GARDHAM and RICHARD SPILLETT FOR MAILONLINE
PUBLISHED: 16:24, 6 September 2019 | UPDATED: 17:50, 6 September 2019
Home Secretary Priti Patel has applied to have some material kept back from the public and victims' families, meaning some evidence could be considered behind closed doors.
The move has led to fears that authorities could avoid proper scrutiny over the investigation into terrorist Salman Abedi before he killed 22 in May 2017.
Some of the evidence in the inquests into the victims of the Manchester bombings could be kept secret if the government gets its way +4
Some of the evidence in the inquests into the victims of the Manchester bombings could be kept secret if the government gets its way
John Cooper, a lawyer representing the families of 11 of the 22 victims, said the secrecy application had come from 'the very people who could potentially be severely criticised'.
Mr Cooper told a hearing that both the security service and police were open to 'severe analysis with potentially severe and critical consequences.'
He said the applications were 'very important' for the families and 'go to the root of understanding what happened to their loved ones as well as a wider public understanding.'
RELATED ARTICLES
Previous
1
Next
Elite anti-terror squad on patrol: Met Police unit armed...
Two Russian spies behind Salisbury Novichok attack are 'now...
SHARE THIS ARTICLE
Share
Pete Weatherby QC, representing two further families, said the families had not been given access to the 'closed schedule' and added: 'We don't even know the categories or the extent – whether it is 10 documents or 10,000.
'There is a fear from the families that the PII applications are being cast too wide and that the amount of material to be considered in open hearings will be a very small amount in regard to the central issues.'
The application to make some of the evidence secret, using so-called Public Interest Immunity (PII) Certificates, was made to coroner, Sir John Saunders, today.
Salman Abedi killed 22 people, including young children, when he blew himself up at the end of an Ariana Grande concert +4
Salman Abedi killed 22 people, including young children, when he blew himself up at the end of an Ariana Grande concert
In a 'unique' move, Ms Patel has indicated that she will allow the coroner to convert the inquest hearing into a public inquiry so that he can consider sensitive material behind closed doors.
It would be the first investigation into a terrorist attack since 9/11 to take place in part behind closed doors.
Sir James Eady, representing the secretary of state, told the hearing the material they sought to exclude was 'of undoubted significance to the issues you will have to consider and we accept that.'
But he said that case law 'makes clear that the national security considerations hold the whip hand.'
He said coroner Sir John Saunders, a former High Court Judge, had to show a 'very, very broad margin of respect' for the opinion of the Home Secretary.
+4
Home Secretary Priti Patel has made an application to keep some evidence secret to the judge acting as coroner in the inquests
Alan Payne QC for Greater Manchester Police, said that 'very significant weight' had been attached to the public interest in the relevant material being disclosed in order to allow a 'full and through investigation.'
He said officers with 'particular expertise in counter-terrorism work' had 'given the most careful consideration to the extent to which material the subject of the PII claims could be made public.'
But he added: 'The conclusions which they have reached are emphatic that the information simply cannot be disclosed without jeopardising security.
Mr Cooper, for some of the victim's families, countered by saying: 'Where there is an event such as the outrageous bombing at Manchester Arena, the stakes are at their highest.
'When you consider arguments before you in closed session you should bear in mind the very people seeking to restrict this material being put in the public domain and the domain of the bereaved families are the very people who could potentially be severely criticised, and the ramifications of that are significant.
'The application to restrict material from the public domain is emanating from the very group of people or organisations who are potentially in the firing line as far as these hearings are concerned.'
Manchester residents grieve in the weeks after the horrific attack in May 2017 +4
Manchester residents grieve in the weeks after the horrific attack in May 2017
He said the certificates should only be granted if there was an 'absolutely exceptional reason' and should not be excluded because it caused 'humiliation' or was 'embarrassing'.
He said the approach of GMP was 'simply not good enough for those that we represent' adding: 'They are going to have to do far better than that to ensure open justice is being tendered in this case.'
The coroner said there was an 'argument for the families learning what has happened which will not happen with a public inquiry.'
But he added: 'If I am carrying out inquiries on the families' behalf they will have to take my word I'm afraid that it is being done thoroughly.'
Sir John Saunders will make his ruling at a later date.
The 22 victims of the Manchester Arena bombing in May 2017
Elaine McIver and Saffie Rose Roussos
Elaine McIver and Saffie Rose Roussos
Elaine McIver, 43: The off-duty police officer died in the attack, which injured her husband and children
Saffie Rose Roussos , 8: The youngest victim was separated from her mother and sister in the seconds after the blast.
Sorrell Leczkowski and Eilidh MacLeod
Sorrell Leczkowski and Eilidh MacLeod
Nell Jones and Olivia Campbell-Hardy
Nell Jones and Olivia Campbell-Hardy
Megan Hurley and Georgina Callander
Megan Hurley and Georgina Callander
Chloe Rutherford and Liam Curry
Chloe Rutherford and Liam Curry
Courtney Boyle and Philip Tron
Courtney Boyle and Philip Tron
Kelly Brewster and Angelika Klis
Kelly Brewster and Angelika Klis
Sorrell Leczkowski , 14: Schoolgirl died in the bomb blast, while her mother, Samantha and grandmother Pauline were badly hurt.
Eilidh MacLeod , 14: Confirmed dead having been missing since being caught up in the blast with her friend Laura MacIntyre.
Nell Jones , 14: Farmer's daughter travelled to the pop concert with her best friend for her 14th birthday.
Olivia Campbell-Hardy , 15: Her family searched desperately for her for nearly 48 hours and even went on TV to plead for news, before they learned of her death.
Megan Hurley , 15: The Liverpool schoolgirl was with her brother who suffered serious injuries in the blast.
Georgina Callander , 18: Met Ariana Grande backstage at a previous gig and died in hospital with her mother at her bedside.
Chloe Rutherford , 17, and Liam Curry , 19: Couple from South Shields 'wanted to be together forever and now they are', their family said.
Courtney Boyle , 19, and Philip Tron , 32: Criminology student and her stepfather were confirmed dead following a Facebook appeal.
John Atkinson , 26: Pop fan from Radcliffe, Greater Manchester, was in a local dance group and was leaving the gig when the blast happened.
John Atkinson and Martyn Hett
John Atkinson and Martyn Hett
Marcin Klis and Michelle Kiss
Marcin Klis and Michelle Kiss
Martyn Hett , 29: Public relations manager from Stockport, who was due to start a two-month 'holiday of a lifetime' to the US two days later.
Kelly Brewster , 32: Civil servant from Sheffield who died trying to shield her 11-year-old niece.
Marcin Kils , 42, and Angelika Kils , 39: Both killed as they waited for their daughters who both survived the blast.
Michelle Kiss , 45: Mother-of-three from Clitheroe, Lancashire, went to the gig with her daughter.
Alison Lowe , 44, and friend Lisa Lees , 43: Both killed when they arrived to pick up their teenage daughters who were not hurt.
Wendy Fawell , 50: Mother from Leeds was killed while picking up her children with a friend.
Jane Taylor , 50: Mother of three from Blackpool was killed as she waited to collect a friend's daughter.
People look at flowers and tributes left in St Ann's Square in Manchester following the Manchester Arena terror attack. (Image: PA)
Arena bomb survivors believe the chance to learn lessons will be “limited” after they were refused a special legal status ahead of an inquiry into the atrocity.
A total of 56 ‘survivor victims’ applied for ‘core participant’ status at the inquiry into the attack - due to take place later this year.
But Chairman Sir John Saunders has today refused their application.
He insisted that the survivors will still have a voice in the inquiry and said they will be able to contribute without core participant status.
Tributes left after the terror attack (Image: Getty Images)
But lawyers acting for the survivors say refusal of that legal status means these victims will not have the same rights and access as groups such as the police and government.
Saoirse de Bont, public law and human rights lawyer at Irwin Mitchell, is representing more than 40 people seriously injured in the bombing.
“The effect this terrible crime has had on hundreds of families can never be underestimated,” she said.
138208749653
“Many of our clients who were bombing victims and caught up in the devastation that night are still trying to come to terms with the life-changing physical and psychological injuries they suffered. Many of these survivor victims were close to death.
“While it is vital that the families who lost loved ones remain at the heart of the inquiry, our clients believed their first-hand accounts of the security measures that were in place on the night and the response to the attack, would be key to the most thorough inquiry being held.
The carpet of floral tributes to the victims and injured of the Manchester Arena bombing covers the ground in St Ann's Square on May 25 2017 (Image: Getty Images)
“The survivor victim families we represent are very disappointed with today’s decision.
“They will not have the same rights and access to the inquiry as other core participants such as the police and government.
"They will not be able to play a core participant role in the inquiry and they believe that the investigation to learn lessons will be limited as a result.
RELATED ARTICLES
CCTV images released after burglars steal car in break-in
No scrubs? No problem for the enterprising neighbours who are sewing for the NHS
“They now hope that as many lessons as possible can be learned to reduce the risk of other families suffering such heartbreak through a similar devastating incident occurring in the future.
“We will continue to support the survivors to help them try and come to terms with how their lives have been irreversibly changed the best they can.”
Mr Justice Saunders’ decision comes two weeks after a videolink hearing in which legal submissions were made.
Police in the aftermath of the Arena bombing (Image: Joel Goodman)
The inquiry’s legal team argued that survivors would not 'materially add to the inquiry achieving its aims'.
But counsel for the survivors said they were 'the living witnesses' to the attack and its aftermath on May 22, 2017, but no one has asked for their input.
A chairman of any public inquiry may designate a person or organisation as a core participant.
RELATED ARTICLES
Metrolink could be shut down unless government bails it out 'within days', Andy Burnham warns
Councillors call for all of Greater Manchester's tips to reopen
If granted, core participants may receive advance disclosure of evidence, make statements at certain hearings or apply through their legal representatives to a chairman to ask questions of certain witnesses.
The former high court judge’s decision today relates to the 56 people who survived the atrocity and applied for ‘core participant’ status.
In a statement, Mr Justice Saunders said: “The injuries, trauma and personal tragedy that the survivors have suffered cannot be overstated and I fully appreciate that this application is borne of the desire of the survivors to ensure that the reasons for the attack are fully understood, the adequacy of the emergency response is examined, and that lessons are learned.
22 people were killed during the atrocity (Image: Daily Mirror)
“After a great deal of anxious thought, I have decided to refuse this application.
“That does not mean that the survivors will not have a voice in this Inquiry; they will.
“The issue for me to decide has been whether in order to have such a voice and effectively participate in this Inquiry, the survivors require Core Participant status.
“After careful consideration, I have concluded that they will be able to contribute to the Inquiry without Core Participant status and I strongly encourage them to do so.”
Those who will have core participant status at the inquiry include the relatives of those who died, the police, the security services and the emergency services.
The inquiry will call on survivors who can give relevant evidence as witnesses.
They will be able to raise concerns with the legal team leading the inquiry and identify “lines of inquiry that they would wish to have pursued”, attend hearings and access transcripts, evidence and documents on the inquiry’s website.
Suicide bomber Salman Abedi, 22, detonated a rucksack bomb in the foyer of the Arena, after an Ariana Grande concert.
The explosion killed 22 bystanders and injured hundreds more.
Abedi’s younger brother, Hashem, was convicted of 22 counts of murder last month after a trial at the Old Bailey. He is yet to be sentenced.
Survivors of the Manchester Arena bombing have been refused ‘core participant’ status during an inquiry into the attack.
Chairman Sir John Saunders has insisted that the survivors will still have a voice in the inquiry and has encouraged them to contribute.
His decision today relates to the 56 people who survived the atrocity and applied for ‘core participant’ status.
A chairman of any public inquiry may designate a person or organisation as a core participant.
If granted, core participants may receive advance disclosure of evidence, make statements at certain hearings or apply through their legal representatives to a chairman to ask questions of certain witnesses.
The Arena attack claimed 22 lives (Image: Daily Mirror)
In a statement, former High Court judge Mr Justice Saunders said the attack has had “a terrible and lasting impact on” the applicants but he has decided to refuse the application.
He said: “The injuries, trauma and personal tragedy that the survivors have suffered cannot be overstated and I fully appreciate that this application is borne of the desire of the survivors to ensure that the reasons for the attack are fully understood, the adequacy of the emergency response is examined, and that lessons are learned.
“After a great deal of anxious thought, I have decided to refuse this application.
RELATED ARTICLES
'Living witnesses' of the Manchester Arena bombing atrocity legally apply to play a key role in the public inquiry
Firefighters tackle huge moorland fire measuring four hectares in Oldham
“That does not mean that the survivors will not have a voice in this Inquiry; they will.
“The issue for me to decide has been whether in order to have such a voice and effectively participate in this Inquiry, the survivors require Core Participant status.
The attack claimed 22 lives (Image: PA)
“After careful consideration, I have concluded that they will be able to contribute to the Inquiry without Core Participant status and I strongly encourage them to do so.”
Mr Justice Saunders said he will call survivors who can give relevant evidence as witnesses during the Inquiry.
“As they were at the scene, they may have critical evidence to provide,” he said.
“The Inquiry will ensure they are able to provide it.
RELATED ARTICLES
Justice for the Manchester Arena atrocity will have to wait - the sentencing of bomber's brother has been put back indefinitely amid the coronavirus lockdown
Council working to repair iconic Manchester Bee sculpture after vandals saw off its head
“Having suffered such serious injuries, the survivors will want answers as to why the attack happened, whether it could have been prevented, and what lessons can be learned.”
Suicide bomber Salman Abedi, 22, detonated a rucksack bomb in the foyer of the Arena after an Ariana Grande concert.
The explosion killed 22 bystanders and injured hundreds more.
Abedi’s younger brother, Hashem, was convicted of 22 counts of murder last month after a trial at the Old Bailey. He is yet to be sentenced.
The chairman hopes the inquiry will give bereaved families and survivors the answers they need.
The inquiry is scheduled to start in September (Image: Getty Images)
As such, survivors will be able to raise any concerns with the legal team leading the inquiry and identify “lines of inquiry that they would wish to have pursued”.
Survivors will also be able to attend the Inquiry’s hearings or view them through an online livestream.
They will also be able to access transcripts, evidence and documents on the Inquiry’s website.
Mr Justice Saunders will have his own independent legal team and four legal teams representing the bereaved families assisting him in the investigation.
He said the inquiry will provide a “full, fair and fearless investigation into the terrible events that resulted in the 22 deaths at the Arena”.
He added: “In the event, I am satisfied that the survivors’ important contribution to the Inquiry can take place without Core Participant status. Their voice is an important one and it will be heard.”
A vigil at Albert Square in the days after the attack (Image: MEN)
During a videolink hearing earlier this month, legal submissions were made to the chairman.
The inquiry’s legal team argued that survivors would not 'materially add to the inquiry achieving its aims'.
But counsel for the survivors said they were 'the living witnesses' to the attack and its aftermath on May 22, 2017, but no one has asked for their input.
Those who will have core participant status at the inquiry include the relatives of those who died, the police, the security services and the emergency services.
The inquiry is due to begin on September 7.
Follow @MENNewsdesk
_________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
The man, named only as witness A, said he approached someone resembling Salman Abedi because he looked "out of place".
By Tom Parmenter, North of England correspondent, and Duncan Gardham, security journalist
Monday 7 September 2020 20:12, UK
HASHEM ABEDIMANCHESTERMANCHESTER BOMBINGSALMAN ABEDI
Salman Abedi
Image:
A man said he warned security about a man fitting the description of Salman Abedi, pictured, before the bombing
Why you can trust Sky News
Manchester Arena bomber Salman Abedi was challenged by a member of the public shortly before he detonated the bomb that killed 22 people at an Ariana Grande concert three years ago.
The details of the confrontation emerged as a public inquiry into the atrocity began in Manchester.
The concertgoer, who can be named only as witness A, said he approached a man resembling Salman Abedi because he looked "out of place" on the night of the 22 May 2017 attack.
A father said he warned security about a man fitting the description of Salman Abedi before the bombing
Inquiry counsel tells of guard seeing suspicious man
The last picture of Salman Abedi, moments before the bomb went off
Image:
Salman Abedi is seen moments before the bomb went off
Witness A said the suspicious man was carrying a large rucksack in the crowded venue.
Paul Greaney QC, counsel to the inquiry, said in the opening hearing: "(The witness) asked the man, what have you got in your rucksack, but got no reply.
"(The witness) then said, 'It doesn't look very good you know, you with a bag in a place like this. What are you doing?"
The man is said to have replied: "I'm waiting for somebody, mate. Have you got the time? What time is it?"
More from Hashem Abedi
Manchester Arena bombing inquiry opens with tribute to victims and call for 'truth'
Manchester Arena bombing: What we can expect from the public inquiry
Manchester Arena bombing: Brother of Hashem and Salman Abedi apologises to victims' families
Manchester Arena bombing: Hashem Abedi sentenced to at least 55 years in prison
Witness A said he was "fobbed off" by security worker Mohammed Agha when he warned him about the suspicious man, the inquiry heard.
The witness had spoken to Mr Agha at 10.14pm, some 17 minutes before the detonation.
The Manchester suicide bomber has been named as Salman Abedi
Image:
Abedi killed 22 people after detonating a bomb in the Manchester Arena
Mr Agha then spoke to his colleague Kyle Lawler about the matter eight minutes before the bomb went off.
But neither security control, nor anyone else, was informed about the suspicious activity, the hearing was told.
Mr Lawler is said to have tried to radio his security colleagues but could not get through.
He then spotted the man get up and start walking towards the arena entrance.
Mr Lawler said in a statement: "I just froze and did not get anything out on the radio. I knew at that point it was too late."
Mr Greaney said the inquiry would examine if mistakes were made: "Why did Mohammed Agha and Kyle Lawler not inform the control room or anyone else between 10.14pm and 10.31pm about the report from witness A of a suspicious male, with backpack, on the mezzanine level of the city room?
What we can expect from the public inquiry
What we can expect from the public inquiry
"If their failure to do so was culpable, was that the result of inadequate training and/or instruction or, instead, the consequence of individual error of ineptitude?"
Another man with concerns about Abedi reported him to a police officer.
Mr Greaney added: "Whether these represent missed opportunities to prevent what happened that night, to reduce its scale… (are) an issue of very considerable importance."
A Police van carrying Hashem Abedi the younger brother of Manchester Arena bomber Salman Abedi arrives at Westminster Magistrates' Court
Image:
Salman Abedi's brother, Hashem Abedi, pictured, has been jailed for life
The inquiry also heard that fire and ambulance crews were delayed getting into the foyer - a matter that experts believe is of "significant concern".
Survivor Sean Gardner has told Sky News that he and many others in the foyer felt abandoned for at least 25 minutes after the explosion: "It has obviously left some really deep scars.
"There was always going to be a five or 10 minute gap but it was 25 minutes before we got any assistance.
"We need to hear the reasons for the delays and hopefully they were the right decisions."
The victims of the Manchester terror attack
The victims of the Manchester terror attack
A previous report by Lord Kerslake found that Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service played "no meaningful role" for nearly two hours and there was "little awareness of what was happening at the arena".
The inquiry also heard that Salman Abedi's older brother Ismail received a text message from family in Libya, three and a half hours before the attack offering him God's blessings, the inquiry heard.
He has refused to take part in the inquiry in case he incriminates himself.
So nervous is she and her poor daughter that she's now blocked me on Facebook.
Before she did, though, she shared these concerns with me which I'm now, after a lot of soul searching, making public to aid the investigation.
Her and her daughter clearly could be the key to overturning the lies told about that terror attack, for which Salman Abedi looks more and more like a patsy for.
She's clearly being TAUGHT by one means and another to KEEP HER MOUTH SHUT.
Her silence may well be putting her and her daughters in more danger from the real perpetrators of the terrorist attack.
The police in Manchester MUST interview and PROTECT her otherwise they may as well all go home!
Please make sure that media, police, intelligence and everybody who's job it is to expose the real Manchester killers looks after Dawn and that the attempt to isolate and threaten her FAILS!
Manchester Arena terror attack eyewitness Dawn Waddy wrote:
Hi xxxx
I'm afraid i really can't talk about this without breaking down
As you can imagine, I am really struggling with this experience, so is my daughter.
Especially today. [the first anniversary]
I will be more than happy to message you on here though.
If you want any questions answering please feel free to ask on here.
Dawn x
Do you have any idea what nationality the woman was Dawn?
Manchester Arena terror attack eyewitness Dawn Waddy wrote:
Well, she didnt have her face covered, or anything over her head, so I doubt whether she was a Muslim, but she definately wasnt british.
But for the security to say to my daughter "how would you like it if someone accused you of something just because you were a different colour"!
But like I reminded them, it isnt white people acting out these attacks and the way she fidgeted made us uneasy.
The Greater Manchester police have not been in touch since they paid me a visit in June [2017].
Whether they would let me know the outcome of whether she was involved I'm not sure, but ive heard nothing since.
They would know by now if she was involved because they had her seat number so could check her ticket details.
Sky news is itself highly suspect but...
"There was a suspicious woman"
A woman who witnessed the terror attack in the Manchester Arena has condemned the venue for a ‘lack of security’ surrounding the event.
The mother, who was with a friend and her daughter at the Ariana Grande concert, says their bags were not searched before they entered the venue and claims her report of a ‘suspicious’ woman was dismissed.
Her group became concerned by a woman sitting next to them who was ‘acting suspiciously’. They reported the woman to security, who did attend to further investigate, but the woman says that their concerns were ultimately dismissed.
She said: ‘We had somebody sat next to us. She looked very suspicious and was fidgeting all the time with her bag on the floor and she was by herself.
Woman speculates about 'suspicious behaviour' of concertgoer
‘She was looking in the direction of where the explosion actually happened all night. She was smirking to herself and we got suspicious. My friend who was sitting next to her said, “I don’t like this”‘.
Speaking with Sky News she revealed: ‘I told security who then informed higher security and they were up and down the stairs where she was, discreetly watching her. Nothing was done about it.
‘Later on, as the concert was going on, she was becoming more and more agitated, with her bag on the floor. I actually sat next to her and I nudged her arm intentionally to speak to her and said “Sorry about that – are you by yourself?” and she said “Yes” and spoke to me, but I didn’t understand her.’
Clearly distressed, the woman added: ‘Security did not listen to me.
‘Holly, my daughter, got very upset about things and went to security but then they asked her “How would you like it if someone accused you of this?’
Mother blasts lax security at Manchester Arena before bomb that killed 22
She claimed no one checked her bags (Picture: Sky News)
‘One to two minutes before the concert finished she disappeared and the explosion went off.’
The woman added to Sky: ‘The security was awful and they did nothing about it. There should have been more security. They never checked bags at all.’
'Big flash of light' concert go-er describes explosion
Speaking to Sky News, witness Kirstyn Pollard, who was at the concert with her nine-year-old daughter, said that their bags were not searched by security either. ‘We were late and that could have been why, but no, they didn’t search my bags,’ she said.
Another witness, Chris Pawley, told Fox News there was seemingly ‘no security whatsoever’.
He said: ‘I’ve been to concerts before and sometimes you get patted down and empty your pockets. There was absolutely nothing at this concert tonight. We just literally got our tickets scanned and went straight in.’
The suicide bomber is thought to have detonated the bomb outside the arena, on the walkway between the venue and the station, in what experts have called a ‘security soft spot‘.
It has now been confirmed that 22 people died and 59 people were injured. They are now being treated in eight hospitals across the Greater Manchester area.
Police have identified the suicide-bomber in the Manchester attack as Salman Abedi but they have yet to figure out how he was able to detonate a bomb in the rotunda area of the arena where families and teens were enjoying an Ariana Grande concert.
Since the explosion, witnesses have come forward telling local news stations that the arena security was very lax as they entered the venue. Many say the security guards were more interested in whether or not the attendees were carrying water bottles than checking bags for weapons.
Three weeks prior to the incident, a woman who was in attendance at an Ed Sheeran concert at the same arena voiced her concern on security measures on TripAdvisor. According to her comment, the arena security guards just scanned her ticket and let her in without having her pass through a medal detector or bag check.
Security experts believe that the lone wolf chose the weakest part of the stadium to attack: the exit. As people flooded out of the stadium area after Grande’s encore performance Abedi detonated a “very sophisticated device” that could be heard from inside the stadium and blocks away in neighborhoods surrounding the area.
Others who were at the stadium said they did not see security as they left the arena after the bomb exploded. The only instruction attendees had was from a voice coming over the loud speaker in the arena telling people to “take your time. No problems here.”
Since the explosion, security around the world has been beefed up. Arenas and venues in the United States, Norway and France have seen additional units deployed despite the fact there are no credible or specific threats to the areas.
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Sun Oct 04, 2020 6:31 pm Post subject:
Sky's Dawn Waddy article
Dawn Waddy Manchester Arena Bombing No Bag Checks Sky News.pdf
Description:
Dawn Waddy Sky News sat next to a 'suspicious woman' whom she and her daughter Holly both reported to security but on the second occasion they accused her of racism
“The revelation that the British government likely had contacts with the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) and the 17 February Martyrs Brigade during the 2011 war in Libya – groups for which the 2017 Manchester bomber and his father reportedly fought at that time – raises fundamental questions about the UK’s links to terrorism. Indeed, a strong case can be made for a devastating conclusion: that the UK is itself a de facto part of the terrorist infrastructure that poses a threat to the British public.”
Mark Curtis — Historian and analyst of UK foreign policy
“The Libyan Fighting Group (…) has been recruiting Libyan and Muslim youth in the UK and Europe and sending them to Libya and other countries to deliver terrorism and death. The previous British government has been pressuring in every way possible the prevalence of these groups and their control of Libya.”
General Khalifa Haftar –Tobruk-led Libyan Government
Astonishingly, despite suspicions that he was a high-level al-Qaeda operative, al-Liby was given political asylum in Britain and lived in Manchester until May of 2000 when he eluded a police raid on his house and fled abroad. The raid discovered a 180-page al-Qaeda ‘manual for jihad’ containing instructions for terrorist attacks.”
The Guardian (November 2002)
“To the civilians suffering the blowback of covert operations, the effect typically manifests itself as “random” acts of political violence without a discernible, direct cause; because the public—in whose name the intelligence agency acted—are unaware of the effected secret attacks that provoked revenge (counter-attack) against them.”
Chalmers Johnson — The Nation (September 2001)
Ramadan Abedi — The Manchester bomber’s father fought against Gaddafi regime with the LIFG terrorist group
Is Ramadan Abedi — the father of Salman Abedi aka the Manchester Arena bomber — a MI6 asset? Specifically, is he the Libyan person known to MI6 as ‘Tunworth’ to whom they once paid large amounts of money to assassinate Gaddafi in 1996? Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_Today
RELATED POST: What will be the blowback for UK government after Libya revelations? by Mark Curtis [Manchester Bombing – May 22 2017]
RELATED POST: Manchester Bombing — What do we know so far? [UPDATE — JUNE 14 2017]
RELATED POST: LIBYA: What is going on?
RELATED POST: Trump ‘Special Envoy’ plans to partition Libya into three
RELATED POST: Libyan intervention based on erroneous assumptions; David Cameron ultimately responsible
RELATED POST: Hillary’s Email Reveals Truth about Libya Bombing: Oil and Golden Dinar
In 1996, MI6 paid one of their assets — codename “Tunworth” — close to £100,000 to assassinate Gaddafi. Despite several D-notices, these facts became public following the revelations of MI5 whistleblower David Shayler. The story is also known as the PT16b Affair.
(NOTE: It did not escape my attention that the key — and highly controversial — piece of evidence against Libya in the 1988 Lockerbie Affair is labelled PT35b.)
Although the assassination attempt failed and innocent civilians were killed, the British government gave Abedi, his family and other members of the LIFG — which was allied to Al Qaeda at the time — asylum in the UK.
On June 22 2017, former MI5 David Shayler said — on the Ritchie Allen radio show — that he is 90% sure that Ramadan Abedi is “Tunworth”. And Shayler may indeed very well be right.
Flashback — Ramadan Abedi –the father of Salman Abedi aka the Manchester Arena Bomber — was a founding member of the Libyan Islamic fighting group (LIFG), also known as Muqtalla group.
In the mid-90s, the LIFG — a terrorist organization affiliated with al-Qaeda — was fighting Gaddafi in the Eastern side of Libya.
Ramadan Abedi, like Anas al-Libi (another founding member of LIFG and a close aide to Bin Laden), is believed to have secured residency in the UK because of his opposition to Gaddafi’s regime.
In March 1998, Libya issued the first Interpol arrest warrant for Bin Laden in connection with the murder in March 1994 of two German anti-terrorism agents, Silvan and Vera Becker.
Pictures of Osama Bin Laden posted on the Interpol’s wanted list in March 1998. The first country to seek Bin Laden’s arrest through Interpol was Libya.
The US and the UK dismissed the importance of the Interpol warrant. According to journalist Guillaume Dasquié and Jean-Charles Brisard — an adviser to French President Jacques Chirac — the British and US intelligence agencies played down the threat because the arrest warrant had come from Libya.
Five months after the warrant was issued, al-Qaeda killed more than 200 people in the truck bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.
The resistance of MI6 and the CIA to the Libyan concerns regarding Bin Laden and al Qaeda is probably best explained by MI6’s involvement with the 1996 LIFG/al-Qaeda coup plot against Gaddafi.
In January 2016, Belhaj Abdel-Hakim surprisingly won the right to sue Jack Straw, the former home secretary, over MI6 involvement in his and his pregnant wife’s rendition to Libya in 2004.
In May 2018, Theresa May issued an unprecedented apology for Britain’s role in the “appalling” treatment of a Libyan dissident and his wife, who were victims of a MI6 rendition operation.
In her letter, which was handed to Belhaj in person by the British ambassador in Istanbul, May said:
“It is clear that you were both subjected to appalling treatment and that you suffered greatly, not least the affront to the dignity of Mrs Boudchar who was pregnant at the time.
“The UK government believes your accounts. Neither of you should have been treated in this way. The UK government’s actions contributed to your detention, rendition and suffering.
“… On behalf of Her Majesty’s government I apologise unreservedly. We are profoundly sorry for the ordeal that you both suffered and our role in it. The UK government has learned many lessons from this period.”
I may become a bit cynical in my old age, but I am not buying the official story of Theresa May’s unprecedented apology and generous £500,000 compensation.
Could it be that this apology was the price to pay for securing Belhaj’s silence over the role that the MI6 collaboration with the LIFG played in the Manchester bombing?
After all, this kind of thing do happen once in a while. The CIA even coined a word to describe such unintended consequence of a covert operation. They call it a ‘blowback’.
TIMELINE
1965 — Ramadan Abedi is born in Tripoli, Libya
Early 90s — Abedi fled the country where he was working as an officer in Muammar Gaddafi’s internal security service
1992 — Ramadan Abedi and his wife, Samia, arrived in Manchester. Ramadan Abedi was given a job at the mosque — Manchester Islamic centre also known as the Didsbury mosque — as a muezzin, to call out prayer five times a day.
1994 — Salman Abedi is born on New Year’s Eve
1995 — Anas al-Libi — a close aide of Osama bin Laden — settles in Manchester and lives in a flat in Didsbury. He is an ally and close friend of Ramadan Abedi. Their wives had been friends since their college days in Tripoli
1995 — The Libyan Islamic Fighting Group is founded to pursue the violent overthrow of Gaddafi
1996 — MI6 paid large sums of money to LIFG (an al-Qaeda cell in Libya) in a doomed attempt to assassinate Colonel Gadaffi
1998 March — Libya issues the first Interpol arrest warrant for bin Laden in connection with the murder in March 1994 of two German anti-terrorism agents, Silvan and Vera Becker, who were in charge of missions in Africa.
1998 — MI6 thwarted early attempts to bring Osama bin Laden to justice
2004 — The US state department designates LIFG a foreign terrorist organisation. It says that elements of LIFG are aligned with Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida
2004 — The United Kingdom launched a crackdown on the group after Tony Blair and Gaddafi struck the controversial “deal in the desert”. The deal led to the rendition of several of the group’s leaders to Libya.
2004 — Abdel-Hakim Belhaj and his wife are seized in Thailand before being hooded, shackled and flown to one of Gaddafi’s prisons, where Belhaj was tortured and sentenced to death. He was released six years later. Boudchar was four and a half months pregnant when she was abducted. She was released shortly before giving birth.
2008 — Ramadan Abedi returned to Libya after a reconciliation deal with the Gadaffi government
2011 — Ramadan Abedi fights against the Gaddafi regime during the Libyan revolution with the Libyan Islamic fighting group (LIFG).
2011 — Abedi is joined by other members of his family after the Gaddafi is overthrown
October 2013 — al-Libi is captured by US commandos in Tripoli. He was one of the FBI Most Wanted. Within hours of his arrest, Ramadan Abedi posted an image of al-Libi on his Facebook page with the words: “The Prophet knows how many have a picture of this lion in their (Facebook) profiles. The weak are forbidden to share it.”
2017 April — Hashem Abedi travelled from the UK to Libya with his brother Salman. Hashem did not return.
2017 May 22 — Manchester Arena – The bombing killed 22 and injured up to 800.
2017 May — Hashem Abedi is arrested in Libya shortly after the attack. A year on he remains in the custody of a militia group in Tripoli.
2018 January — Mr Belhaj wins the right to sue Jack Straw, the former home secretary, over MI6 involvement in his and his pregnant wife’s rendition to Libya in 2004.
2018 May — Theresa May issues an unprecedented apology for Britain’s role in the “appalling” treatment of Belhaj and his wife –
Father of Manchester Bomber: “I didn’t expect that to happen”
Published on May 25, 2017 — Ramadan Abedi, the father of Salman who is accused of killing 22 concert-goers at Manchester Arena, told Reuters in Libya that ‘everything was normal’ when he last spoke to his son.
Ramadan was detained by Tripoli counter-terrorism force during the interview.
REFERENCES
Bomber’s father fought against Gaddafi regime with ‘terrorist’ group — The Guardian
MI6 ‘halted bid to arrest bin Laden’ — The Guardian
Britain apologises for ‘appalling treatment’ of Abdel Hakim Belhaj — The Guardian
=
UK — Is the Father of the Manchester Bomber a MI6 Asset? _________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
Londoners pay tribute to victims of the 2017 London Bridge terror attack. (Photo: Dan Kitwood / Getty Images)
The public inquiry into the 2017 Manchester terrorist attack shows no sign of investigating the UK’s covert role in the Libya war of 2011 — in which the Manchester bomber had fought. He is one of four terrorists from that conflict who went on to slaughter 63 people, mainly Britons, in separate attacks — and they may even have received military training from UK-allied forces.
Mark Curtis
Manchester bomber Salman Abedi, Reading knifeman Khairi Saadallah and London Bridge terrorist Rachid Redouane all fought with Islamist groups in the UK’s 2011 war in Libya
Another veteran was Tunisian terrorist Seifeddine Rezgui who mowed down 30 Britons on a beach six years ago next month
Qatar provided arms and money to the Libyan rebels in 2011 with the blessing of David Cameron’s government
Britain likely had covert contacts with the Islamist forces and may even have been involved in training them
While David Cameron faces awkward questions about his role in political lobbying, he is escaping accountability for a far worse offence — Britain’s secret alliance with radical Islamist elements in the Libyan war of 2011.
Many militants who fought in the Nato-backed war that overthrew Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi went on to become involved in terrorism, with four slaughtering Britons in separate attacks at a park, a music concert, a market and a beach.
Their collective victims number 63.
A year ago next month, Khairi Saadallah stabbed six people socialising in a park in Reading, southern England. His attack, which took place in under a minute, killed three people.
In his subsequent trial, the court heard that Saadallah, a 26-year-old Libyan who came to the UK in 2012, had fought for eight months in the 2011 war in his country.
Another veteran was Salman Abedi, the Manchester bomber who detonated a homemade, shrapnel-laden explosive four years ago this week, killing 22 innocent people attending an Ariane Grande pop concert.
Two other terrorists who later killed Britons also fought in the UK’s war in Libya. Rachid Redouane, a Moroccan, was one of three men who carried out the terrorist attack on London Bridge and neighbouring Borough market four years ago next month.
The men drove a van into pedestrians and proceeded to stab bystanders before police arrived and shot dead all three assailants. Eight people were killed and 48 injured.
David Cameron celebrates in Benghazi, Libya, with French president Nicholas Sarkozy in 2011. (Photo: Stefan Rousseau / Getty Images)
Six years earlier, Redouane had travelled to Libya, his father’s country of birth, to fight in the war against Gaddafi’s forces.
It is not known if Redouane had any contacts with another future terrorist who was also in Libya at the time: Seifeddine Rezgui. A Tunisian, Rezgui is reported to have joined the war against Gaddafi by accompanying men who were smuggling arms to the rebels, and may have taken part in military action.
Four years later, in June 2015, Rezgui mowed down 38 tourists with a machine gun at a beach hotel in the Tunisian resort of Port El Kantaoui, in the name of the Islamic State terrorist group.
Thirty British tourists were among the dead in the worst attack on Britons since the July 2005 London bombings. It was Tunisia’s deadliest attack ever.
The terrorism perpetrated by these four militants raises further questions about the UK’s role in the Libyan war and its links to the radical Islamist forces for whom the likes of Abedi, Saadallah, Redouane and Rezgui were fighting.
The UK’s key ally
Britain’s Royal Air Force conducted numerous air attacks on Gaddafi’s forces in 2011, alongside French warplanes, which likely killed hundreds of civilians according to a recent study by the investigative group Airwars.
But it is the UK’s covert role in the war, and its support of Qatar, that are just as controversial.
The oil and gas-rich Gulf state of Qatar poured massive quantities of arms and money into the hands of the militant groups fighting Gaddafi. It was part of the regime’s broader foreign policy which seeks to actively support Islamist groups across the Middle East — some of which want to stand in democratic elections, while others have more sinister ambitions.
To this end, the Qatari regime is believed to have supplied at least 20,000 tons of weapons to Libyan rebel forces in 2011, including machine guns, automatic rifles, ammunition and anti-tank guns.
Qatar also sent hundreds of its own troops to support the Libyan rebels and is reported to have funded them to the tune of $400-million.
This support was given with the blessing of David Cameron’s UK, which was opposed to Norwegian attempts to broker a peaceful outcome. The Times reported in August 2011, six months after the uprising against Gaddafi had begun, that Britain and France were “using Qatar to bankroll the Libyan rebels”.
The reason was that Nato airstrikes, which began in March 2011, had so far failed to dislodge Gaddafi while the rebels “lack the firepower and military discipline to take advantage on the ground”.
David Cameron greets the Emir of Qatar at 10 Downing Street in 2010. (Photo: Dan Kitwood / Getty Images)
The Obama administration in the US secretly approved Qatar’s arms shipments to Libya in spring 2011 and, according to the New York Times, “within weeks… began receiving reports that they were going to Islamic militant groups”.
But this did not make Britain, the US and France reconsider their support for Qatar’s arms shipments.
Qatar’s chief-of-staff, Major-General Hamad bin Ali al-Atiya, said at the time that the Gulf state “supervised the rebels’ plans”, adding: “We acted as the link between the rebels and Nato forces.”
Indeed, Qatar stated the following year that its actions in arming the opposition forces “were in full coordination with Nato and under its umbrella”.
The Gulf regime backed various opposition groups in Libya and the sheer quantity of arms and finance, alongside the fluidity between the rebel forces, makes it likely they all benefited, directly or indirectly.
The Libyan Islamic Fighting Group
One militia that received Qatari support was the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), an armed force created in 1995 to establish an Islamic state in Libya. This is significant in that Manchester bomber Salman Abedi is reported to have joined and fought with the LIFG in the 2011 war.
He had been brought to the conflict by his father, Ramadan, who is known to have been a prominent member of the LIFG since its founding.
The LIFG was the group that Britain’s external intelligence agency, MI6, covertly financed to assassinate Gadaffi in 1996, in a plot that failed. When Gadaffi’s regime clamped down on the militia following the assassination attempt, the UK gave refuge to some of its members and dozens were allowed to settle in Britain.
An extraordinary admission was made by the British government in March 2018, when it told parliament it “likely” had contacts with the LIFG in Libya during the 2011 war. It added that it was “in communication with a wide range of Libyans involved in the conflict”.
This admission has never been reported in the British press.
It is possible that British covert forces operating in Libya were supporting the LIFG. Within a month of the uprising beginning, in March 2011, the then foreign secretary William Hague admitted to parliament that UK special forces were in Libya, after a joint SAS-MI6 team was captured by suspicious farmers.
David Cameron and William Hague land at Tripoli airport in 2011. (Photo: Stefan Rousseau / Getty Images)
Then in August 2011, press reports noted that Britain’s SAS and French special forces were on the ground in the eastern part of the country, “calling in air strikes and helping rebel units” to assault cities still in the hands of pro-Gaddafi forces.
The Guardian noted that the British soldiers were taking “a leading role not only in guiding bombers to blast a path for opposition fighters but also in planning the offensive that finally broke the six-month siege of Misrata”, a coastal city in northwest Libya.
But the UK did not just secretly back the Islamist forces in Libya. The British government appears to have facilitated them reaching the conflict zone in the first place.
Middle East Eye has revealed the British government operated an “open door” policy — with the support of the domestic security agency, MI5 — which allowed Libyan exiles in Britain and British-Libyan citizens to join the uprising.
Several former rebel fighters said they had been able to travel to Libya with “no questions asked”. These dissidents were members of the LIFG and most were from Manchester, Abedi’s home town which was also the centre for Libyan Islamists in the UK.
Journalist Peter Oborne has written that Libyan dissidents were “undoubtedly encouraged” to travel to Libya to oust Gaddafi and that this was with the “encouragement of MI6”. The British authorities were even said to have released terror suspects from the control orders on them that were in place at the time, to facilitate them getting to Libya.
Training terrorists?
It is possible that some of the future terrorists were given military training in Libya at this time, another question the Manchester bombing inquiry should put to David Cameron, special forces commanders and intelligence chiefs.
Britain is known to have trained rebel groups in advance of the attack on Tripoli and, along with Qatari and French forces, is also reported to have secretly trained opposition fighters in the Nafusa mountains in northwest Libya, 210 kilometres from Tripoli.
It was there, in the town of Nalut, at the western end of the mountains, that the Tripoli-based Liwa al Ummah unit is said to have received training from Qatari special forces. London Bridge attacker Redouane fought in this unit in Libya.
The militia was founded by Mahdi Al-Harati, an Irish-Libyan who led the Tripoli Brigade during the battle of Tripoli in 2011.
Qatar’s training of the militia groups is reported to have involved “about 30 Western liaison officers, including Britons, French and several Americans”. Reading attacker Saadallah claims to have been trained by French soldiers in Libya.
France is also known to have dropped consignments of machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and anti-tank missiles to the rebels in the Nafusa mountains.
The UK government has denied playing any role in Qatar’s training of armed opposition groups in Libya.
The militant force for whom Saadallah fought in Libya was Ansar al-Sharia, which had formed at the beginning of the uprising against Gaddafi. The following year, it was involved in the attack on the US consulate in Benghazi, Libya’s main eastern city, which resulted in the death of US ambassador Christopher Stevens.
Two other British Islamists who fought in Libya — again reportedly with the Tripoli Brigade — were the Abdallah brothers, Mohammed and Abdalraouf, also of Manchester.
Mohammed Abdallah was in 2017 found guilty by a British court of possessing an AK47 rifle, receiving money for terrorism and of membership of Islamic State. He was jailed for 10 years.
He was assisted by his brother Abdalraouf who had been paralysed from the waist down after being shot while taking part in the 2011 Libyan war. Five years later, back in the UK, Abdalraouf was found guilty of assisting others in committing acts of terrorism and terror funding and jailed for five and a half years.
Abdalraouf Abdallah was in touch with Manchester bomber Salman Abedi in the months leading up to the attack in May 2017 and is considered to have been a radicalising influence on him. DM
Mark Curtis is editor of Declassified UK, an investigative journalism organisation that covers the UK’s role in the world.
Follow Declassified on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Sign up to receive Declassified’s monthly newsletter here.
ON Thursday we had the corporate media trumpeting the “breaking news” of a report by the Intelligence and Security Committee on the “failings” of MI5 regarding the Manchester bombing.
Chair Dominic Grieve gravely announced that “MI5 moved too slowly to establish the danger posed by the bomber, Salman Abedi” and that “MI5 decided not to place travel monitoring or travel restrictions on Abedi and this allowed him to return undetected to the United Kingdom.”
“Undetected?” That’s interesting. Because the truth is that the security services, far from being apathetic in this affair, were intimately involved in facilitating the travel of British Libyans and exiled Libyans based in Manchester to Libya in 2011, the year, you might remember, when our government was making huge efforts to rid that country of Muammar Gadaffi.
As an independent journalist who wrote about the Manchester bombing in June 2017, this characterisation of events leaves me sickened. A more cynical distortion of the state’s role in this affair would be hard to imagine, but the majority of the public will never know this thanks to the lies by omission of the “mainstream” media.
In May last year, I read the stunning Middle East Eye report, “Sorted” by MI5: How UK government sent British-Libyans to fight Gadaffi” which documents how the British government lifted control orders on Libyan exiles and British/Libyan residents affiliated with the proscribed terrorist group LIFG (Libyan Islamic Fighting Group) giving them back their passports “just as the UK’s war against Gadaffi intensified, with the UK, France and the US carrying out air strikes and deploying special forces soldiers in support of the rebels.”
Theresa May was home secretary at this time and was responsible for this travesty which amounted, as we tragically discovered, to a grave threat to the security of the British public.
On Thursday, Grieve asserted that “this [Manchester] could not have been predicted in any way at all … we saw nothing to suggest that anyone could possibly have predicted what [Abedi] was going to do.”
What planet is this man on? He is either aware of the truth and is lying or he is unaware of it, in which case he is not fit to carry out an investigation.
The Middle East Eye report carried an interview with Belal Younis, a British Libyan, who revealed how he was stopped by counter-terrorism officers on his return to Britain after a visit to Libya in 2011, “but after providing them with the name and phone number of the MI5 officer he had spoken to previously, and following a quick phone call to him, he was waved through. As he waited to board the plane, he said the same MI5 officer called him to tell him that he had ‘sorted it out.’
“The government didn’t put any obstacles in the way of people going to Libya,” he told Middle East Eye. “The majority who went from here were from Manchester.”
Previously, Younis told Middle East Eye, he had been asked by an MI5 officer: “Are you willing to go into battle?”
“While I took time to find an answer he turned and told me the British government have no problem with people fighting against Gadaffi.”
Another British Libyan told Middle East Eye that he was “shocked” that he was able to travel to Libya in 2011 shortly after his control order was lifted.
“I was allowed to go, no questions asked,” he says, going on to reveal that he met “several other British-Libyans in London who also had control orders lifted.”
This was the same time, as Middle East Eye reminds us, that Britain, the US and France were bombing Libya (death toll: 100,000 innocent people) and putting special forces on the ground in support of elements opposed to Gadaffi.
This source confirmed to Middle East Eye that “within days” of their control orders being lifted, British authorities returned their passports, adding: “These were old school LIFG guys, they [the British authorities] knew what they were doing.”
It’s not difficult to see why MI5 would be interested in effectively recruiting LIFG members for their Libya project.
In 1996 they carried out a failed assassination attempt against Gadaffi which was, according to MI5 whistleblower, David Shayler, funded by MI6, this being one of the reasons he left MI5, later explaining he was “physically sickened by the fact that MI6 wanted to sponsor Islamic extremists and carry out terrorism.”
He expanded: “I joined the service to stop terrorism and prevent the deaths of innocent people, not to get involved in these despicable and cowardly acts.
“I still cannot believe that the Prime Minister has refused to take my evidence or investigate this matter as this decision has sent out a clear message to the intelligence services that they can fund terrorism, conspire to murder people with impunity, and take enormous risks with our security.
“After all, would you give an individual you hardly know, who has admitted to connections with al-Qaida, an enormous sum to carry out a terrorist attack, when you know the group he is leading is opposed to the values of Western society? It is difficult to imagine a greater disregard and contempt for the lives and security of the British people.”
How tragically these words echo now. How terribly prescient they are in light of Manchester’s grief. And how illuminating they are regarding the unseen — and unreported — shameful programme of deep-state depravity carried out under the noses of those who have reported on MI5’s “failings” today.
Historian Mark Curtis is author of the book Secret Affairs, which documents, using declassified government files, the long collusion of the British state with radical Islam to advance its foreign policy aims.
Curtis is well placed to remark that “the culture of lying to and misleading the electorate is deeply embedded in British policy-making,” enabled by the elite’s “endemic contempt for the general population.” A contempt which means that, “Labour and Conservative governments have connived with militant groups … to control oil resources, overthrow governments and promote Britain's financial interests.”
This is the reality which the corporate media will never reveal. But is that because they are not aware of the facts? Sadly not. I emailed Jon Snow of Channel 4 News last year making sure to include all of the information above and asking him, as a leading journalist on what is widely considered to be our most radical news programme, “why have you chosen not to report this story?” His reply was short but not so sweet: “I’m sorry Alison … it’s been so hard to keep up. I will try to pursue this the moment i can take breath. best Jon” He didn’t.
And now his corporate media colleagues will report all this, as the regrettable “failure” by MI5 we are told it is by a team of MPs who have investigated it thoroughly on our behalf. It’s all OK. Grieve assured us that “MI5 have revised their policies” and that “improvements are planned.”
You cannot post new topics in this forum You cannot reply to topics in this forum You cannot edit your posts in this forum You cannot delete your posts in this forum You cannot vote in polls in this forum You can attach files in this forum You can download files in this forum
FAQ
Search
Memberlist
Chat
Usergroups
Calendar
Register
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
