The 28-year-old man who used a knife to attack several people at the London Bridge had been convicted of terrorism in 2012. He was released a year ago. The attacker was known to the authorities.
– Rita Cyprian
▲ The attack took place early Friday afternoon near the London Bridge in the United Kingdom
Usman Khan, the man who attacked several people with a knife by the London Bridge this Friday, was known to the authorities. The 28-year-old man had been convicted of terrorism in 2012 for being involved in planning an al-Qaeda-inspired attack on the London Stock Exchange. Khan was part of a group of nine London extremists, Stoke-on-Trent and Cardiff. He was the youngest, but one of those who took jihadism most seriously, said The Guardian, who consulted the 2012 judgment.
Khan, born in Pakistan, wanted to set up a terrorist training school in Kashmir, on land that belonged to his family. According to an independent report on terrorism from 2013, the attacker even traveled to Pakistan accompanied by two other men from Stoke-on-Trent, a town in central England. They were part of the group that wanted to pump bombs in the London Stock Exchange toilets and several pubs in Stoke, and had access to English copies of Al-Qaida magazine, Inspire . The operation was dismantled by MI5 and the police.
A target list found by the authorities included names and addresses of personalities such as the mayor of London, the dean of St Paul’s Cathedral, the US ambassador to London, and Boris Johnson. Wiretapping at extremist homes made it possible to record conversations in which they argued that Hitler was on the side of the Muslims because he realized that “the Jews were dangerous.” According to The Guardian, the group argued that fewer than 100,000 Jews had died during World War II, when estimates point to 6 million.
In a sentence condemning the group of jihadists in 2012, Justice Justice Wilkie found that they had embarked “on a serious and long-term adventure in terrorism” that could result in atrocities committed in the United Kingdom. Usman Khan was prevented from being released from prison while considered a public hazard, but the sentence was revised in April 2013 and changed to 16 years in prison. The attacker went on parole in December 2018.
Friday’s attack near the London Bridge has killed two people. The jihadist was shot down by the authorities. There are three injured people, one man and one woman.
