The perpetrator of the recent knife attack in London injured two passers-by. He was recently released from custody. A reason for Prime Minister Johnson to revise the prison system.
After another stabbing attack in London, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has announced rapid consequences for the prison system. He said he would announce “fundamental changes” in dealing with terrorist offenders on Monday, Johnson said. In the afternoon, a recently released Islamist injured at least two people before he was shot by the police.
The perpetrator wore a dummy that looked like an explosive vest. The 20-year-old was recently released from prison, where he was held for “crimes related to Islamism,” said police officer Lucy D’Orsi. According to British media reports, the man was convicted of 13 terrorist offenses in 2018 and recently released.
The Guardian newspaper reported that the man had been arrested for spreading Islamist extremist propaganda. According to information from Sky News, he was released in January after serving about half of a three-year prison sentence.
During the act on Sunday, an anti-terrorist unit was “preventively” on site, the police said. It seemed to confirm media reports that the perpetrator had been under surveillance. In the early afternoon, the man attacked passers-by with a stabbing weapon in a busy shopping street in Streatham in south London. He injured at least two people.
The condition of one of the victims, whose injuries had initially been described as life-threatening, has since improved, the police spokeswoman said. An injured woman was able to leave the hospital. Another woman was injured, apparently not directly from the perpetrator, but from flying glass fragments. Her injuries were only minor, police said.
An eyewitness reported that the attacker was armed with a machete. “Silver canisters” were attached to his chest. Videos were uploaded to the online networks to show the police operation. It shows how armed police officers approach a motionless man lying on the ground, suddenly back away and ask bystanders to move away as well.
The British capital had been shaken several times by Islamist attacks in recent years. In late November, an attacker stabbed two people on London Bridge and injured several others before he was shot by the police. The jihadist militia Islamic State (IS) claimed this knife attack for itself. The attacker, 28-year-old Brit Usman Khan, had already been convicted of a terrorist offense in 2012 and was also released early.
Johnson had already announced tightening of the law after the November act. On Sunday, he thanked the emergency services. “My thoughts are with the injured and everyone concerned,” he said. Minister of the Interior Priti Patel praised the courage of the security forces. London Mayor Sadiq Khan said the “terrorists’ strategy to split us and destroy our way of life” would not work.
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