LONDON: A man released early from a prison sentence for terror offenses who was shot dead by police after going on a stabbing spree, was lawfully killed, an inquest jury said Friday.
But the jury at the Royal Courts of Justice in central London also concluded that the attack could have been prevented if Sudesh Amman had been recalled to prison after buying items used to make a fake suicide belt.
Undercover officers shot dead Amman, 20, at close range after he stole a knife and injured two members of the public in Streatham, south London, on February 2, 2020.
The knife attack came just months after another man, who was also freed part-way through a prison sentence for terror offenses, killed two people in central London.
Both cases forced the British government to tighten early release rules for serious offenders, including for those found guilty of extremism.
Amman, born in Coventry, central England, and of Sri Lankan descent, was convicted in 2018 of 13 counts of collecting material useful for terrorism and disseminating terrorist publications, and given a 40-month prison sentence.
A police report compiled before he was freed in January 2020 called him “one of the most dangerous individuals we have investigated” because of his extremist views.
The court was told his behavior in prison had been increasingly violent and he had wanted to join Daesh, become a suicide bomber and kill the Queen.
Intelligence officers involved in the case said he remained an individual of “great concern” and wanted him to remain behind bars as he was still a danger to the public.
But even after he was spotted buying items for a fake suicide belt, which prompted an emergency meeting to discuss his actions, he was kept under 24-hour surveillance.
The jury said the probation service “missed an opportunity” to recall him to prison.
Firearms officers defended their use of deadly force after he went on the rampage with a butcher’s knife, saying it prevented a greater tragedy.
The coroner, judge Nicholas Hilliard, said officers “put themselves in harm’s way.”
“They are to be commended for their bravery and they are owed a considerable debt of gratitude for their bravery,” he added.
A separate inquest held into the police shooting of Usman Khan also condemned official failings that allowed him to knife two people to death near London Bridge in November 2019.
Khan, who was also found to be wearing a hoax suicide belt, was similarly under surveillance by counter-terror police and the domestic intelligence service, MI5.
UK knife attack by terror convict could have been stopped: Jury
https://arab.news/9k2q4
UK knife attack by terror convict could have been stopped: Jury
- A police report called Amman “one of the most dangerous individuals we have investigated”
- The court was told his behavior in prison had been increasingly violent and he had wanted to join Daesh, become a suicide bomber
Rubio defends US ouster of Venezuela’s Maduro to Caribbean leaders unsettled by Trump policies
BASSETERRE, St. Kitts and Nevis: US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Wednesday defended the Trump administration’s military operation to capture Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro, telling Caribbean leaders, many of whom objected to that move, that the country and the region were better off as a result.
Speaking to leaders from the 15-member Caribbean Community bloc at a summit in the country of St. Kitts and Nevis, Rubio brushed aside concerns about the legality of Maduro’s capture last month that have been raised among Venezuela’s island-state neighbors and others.
“Irrespective of how some of you may have individually felt about our operations and our policy toward Venezuela, I will tell you this, and I will tell you this without any apology or without any apprehension: Venezuela is better off today than it was eight weeks ago,” Rubio told the leaders in a closed-door meeting, according to a transcript of his remarks later distributed by the US State Department.
Rubio said that since Maduro’s ouster and the effective takeover of Venezuela’s oil sector by the United States, the interim authorities in the South American country have made “substantial” progress in improving conditions by doing “things that eight or nine weeks ago would have been unimaginable.”
The Caribbean leaders have gathered to debate pressing issues in a region that President Donald Trump has targeted for a 21st-century incarnation of the Monroe Doctrine meant to ensure Washington’s dominance in the Western Hemisphere. The Republican administration has declared a focus closer to home even as Washington increasingly has been preoccupied by the possibility of a US military attack on Iran.
Rubio downplays antagonism in US regional push
In his remarks to the group, America’s top diplomat tried to play down any antagonistic intent in what Trump has referred to as the “Donroe Doctrine.” Rubio said the administration wants to strengthen ties with the region in the wake of the Venezuela operation and ensure that issues such as crime and economic opportunities are jointly addressed.
“I am very happy to be in an administration that’s giving priority to the Western Hemisphere after largely being ignored for a very long time,” Rubio said. “We share common opportunities, and we share some common challenges. And that’s what we hope to confront.”
He said transnational criminal organizations pose the biggest threat to the Caribbean while recognizing that many are buying weapons from the United States, a problem he said authorities are tackling.
Rubio also said the US and the Caribbean can work together on economic advancement and energy issues, especially because many leaders at the four-day summit have energy resources they seek to explore. “We want to be your partner in that regard,” he said.
Rubio said the US recognizes the need for fair, democratic elections in Venezuela, which lies just miles away from Trinidad and Tobago at the closest point.
“We do believe that a prosperous, free Venezuela who’s governed by a legitimate government who has the interests of their people in mind could also be an extraordinary partner and asset to many of the countries represented here today in terms of energy needs and the like, and also one less source of instability in the region,” he said.
Rubio added: “We view our security, our prosperity, our stability to be intricately tied to yours.”
Trump plays up Maduro’s ouster
Trump, in his State of the Union address Tuesday night, called the operation that spirited Maduro out of Venezuela to face drug trafficking charges in New York “an absolutely colossal victory for the security of the United States.”
The US had built up the largest military presence in the Caribbean Sea in generations before the Jan. 3 raid. That has now been exceeded by the surge of American warships and aircraft to the Middle East as the administration pressures Iran to make a deal over its nuclear program.
In the Caribbean, Trump has stepped up aggressive tactics to combat alleged drug smuggling with a series of strikes on boats that have killed over 150 people and he has tightened pressure on Cuba. Regional leaders have complained about administration demands for nations to accept third-country deportees from the US and to chill relations with China.
One regional leader who has backed the US escalation is Trinidad and Tobago Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar, whom Rubio thanked for her “public support for US military operations in the South Caribbean Sea,” the State Department said.
Persad-Bissessar told reporters that her conversation with Rubio focused on “Haiti; we talked about Cuba of course; we talked about engagements with Venezuela and the way forward.”
She was asked if she considered the latest US military strikes in Caribbean waters as extrajudicial killings: “I don’t think they are, and if they are, we will find out, but our legal advice is they are not.”
Rubio had other one-on-one meetings with heads of government, including from St. Kitts and Nevis, Haiti, Jamaica and Guyana.
Caribbean leaders point to shifting global order
Trump said during the State of the Union that his administration is “restoring American security and dominance in the Western Hemisphere, acting to secure our national interests and defend our country from violence, drugs, terrorism and foreign interference.”
Terrance Drew, prime minister of St. Kitts and Nevis and chair of the Caribbean Community bloc, said the region “stands at a decisive hour” and that “the global order is shifting.”
Drew and other leaders said Cuba’s humanitarian situation must be addressed.
“It must be clear that a prolonged crisis in Cuba will not remain confined to Cuba,” Jamaican Prime Minister Andrew Holness warned. “It will affect migration, security and economic stability across the Caribbean basin.”
The US Treasury Department on Wednesday slightly eased restrictions on the sale of Venezuelan oil to Cuba, which instituted austere fuel-saving measures in the weeks after the US raid in Venezuela.
That move came hours before Cuba’s government announced that its soldiers killed four people aboard a speedboat registered in Florida that had opened fire on officers in Cuban waters.
