British spy agency concludes terror attack at Manchester Arena could have been prevented

Manchester.
(Image credit: OLI SCARFF/AFP/Getty Images)

The perpetrator of the Manchester Arena bombing had been on British spy agency MI5's radar for years, The Telegraph reported Friday. An internal review of British law enforcement discovered that Salman Abedi, the 22-year-old suicide bomber who killed 22 people when he detonated explosives at the concert venue in May, accidentally became a "subject of interest" for MI5 in a case of mistaken identity in 2014.

Abedi was apparently enough of a concern, however, that his case was going to be up for reconsideration at a meeting scheduled for May 31 — just nine days after he carried out his attack.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
Explore More
To continue reading this article...
Continue reading this article and get limited website access each month.
Get unlimited website access, exclusive newsletters plus much more.
Cancel or pause at any time.
Already a subscriber to The Week?
Not sure which email you used for your subscription? Contact us
Kelly O'Meara Morales

Kelly O'Meara Morales is a staff writer at The Week. He graduated from Sarah Lawrence College and studied Middle Eastern history and nonfiction writing amongst other esoteric subjects. When not compulsively checking Twitter, he writes and records music, subsists on tacos, and watches basketball.