Report: Manchester Arena attack could have been averted

A review commissioned by the British Government says that a May 22 suicide attack at an Ariana Grande concert at the Manchester Arena could have been averted.

But Britain’s domestic intelligence agency M15 had not taken seriously enough intelligence that they received about the bomber, Salman Abedi.

The 22-year old had been a “subject of interest” (SOI) but was not under active investigation at the time of the attack.

“It is conceivable that the Manchester attack in particular might have been averted had the cards fallen differently,” concluded the review by David Anderson QC, the UK’s former independent reviewer of terrorism legislation.

Manchester-born Abedi had travelled to and from Libya before he struck at Manchester Arena, killing 22 people and wounding more than 100.

“An opportunity was missed by MI5 to place Salman Abedi on ports action following his travel to Libya in April 2017.

“This would have triggered an alert when he returned shortly before the attack, which could have enabled him to be questioned and searched at the airport by CT Policing under Schedule 7 to the Terrorism Act 2000.”

It’s a moot point if Abedi would have abandoned the attack even if he had been questioned by authorities.

Anderson appreciated that the decision to close Abedi as a SOI was “sound on the basis of the information available at the time,” and that the intelligence given to M15 “was not appreciated at that time.”

He also pointed out that authorities “got a great deal right” and had averted a lot of other planned attacks by others.

British counterterrorism forces are currently running 500 operations involving 3000 individuals.

The idea of the review, he said, was not to “assign blame but learn from past mistakes.”

Manchester Arena was one of four attacks on London and Manchester between March and June 2017 that the review assessed.