LONDON: The attack on a Manchester pop concert that killed 22 people was “likely” the work of more than one person, British interior minister Amber Rudd said Wednesday.
“It was a devastating occasion, it was more sophisticated than some of the attacks we’ve seen before, and it seems likely — possible — that he wasn’t doing this on his own,” she told BBC radio.
Rudd confirmed that bomber Salman Abedi, a British man of Libyan heritage who died in the explosion on Monday night, had been on the radar of the security services.
“We do know that he was known up to a point to the intelligence services,” she told Sky News.
Clarifying this on the BBC she said: “The security services will know a lot of people. It doesn’t mean that they’re expected to arrest everybody they know.
“But it is somebody that they had known.”
She said she had “complete confidence” in the security services.
The minister said she was “not surprised at all” that the attack had been claimed by the Daesh group, but said there was no information yet to confirm the extremist organization’s active direction.
Britain’s national terror threat level was raised late Tuesday to “critical,” meaning another attack may be imminent, following the attack on the concert of US singer Ariana Grande.
London police said Wednesday they would be calling in the army to help guard key landmarks, including Buckingham Palace, the Houses of Parliament and foreign embassies.
Manchester bomber was ‘likely’ acting with others: minister
Manchester bomber was ‘likely’ acting with others: minister
OSCE to probe Georgia over human rights concerns
- OSCE said they were invoking the so-called Moscow mechanism to “establish a fact-finding mission” focusing on Georgia
- The mission will “assess Georgia’s implementation of its OSCE commitments”
VIENNA: The world’s largest regional security organization will probe the human rights situation in Georgia, with members expressing “increasing concern” about democratic backsliding in the Caucasus nation in a statement Thursday.
Authorities in the Black Sea country have in recent years pursued a crackdown on the opposition and have jailed prominent pro-EU figures.
The government has faced accusations of democratic backsliding, drifting toward Russia and derailing Georgia’s bid to join the European Union — allegations it rejects.
In a joint statement seen by AFP, 24 members of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) said they were invoking the so-called Moscow mechanism to “establish a fact-finding mission” focusing on Georgia.
The mission will “assess Georgia’s implementation of its OSCE commitments, with a particular focus on developments since spring 2024.”
“We have followed closely and with increasing concern the human rights situation in Georgia,” said the joint statement made by 23 European countries and Canada.
The countries urged Georgia “to cooperate with and facilitate the work of the mission.”
Under the mechanism, experts on a mission have a time frame of several weeks to submit their report.
Most recently, the mechanism has been invoked several times to send experts to Ukraine since Russia’s invasion in 2022, with them finding “clear patterns of international humanitarian law violations.”
Founded in 1975 to ease tensions between the East and the West during the Cold War, the Vienna-based OSCE counts 57 members from Europe, Central Asia and North America, including Russia, Ukraine and the United States.
