Salih Khater: Westminster attack suspect arrested on suspicion of 'act of terrorism' and attempted murder, police say

Terror suspect remains in custody as police work to establish his motive

A man accused of mowing down cyclists and deliberately crashing a car into security barriers outside the Houses of Parliament has been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder and an act of terrorism.

Police have not identified the 29-year-old suspect, who was named locally as Salih Khater, but said he is a British national originally from Sudan.

A spokesperson for Scotland Yard said: “He was arrested on suspicion of the commission, preparation and instigation of acts of terrorism, under section 41 of the Terrorism Act (TACT) 2000, and detained under TACT.

“He was subsequently further arrested for attempted murder.”

Mr Khater remains in police custody as police search a third property linked to him in Birmingham.

Investigators have already finished searching two other locations in the city, as well as another in Nottingham.

But they have still not established his possible motive, and will be looking for any evidence of political or religious affiliations.

“Given that it appears to have been a deliberate act, the method used and the iconic location, it is being treated as a terrorist incident and the investigation is being led by officers from the Met’s Counter Terrorism Command,” a spokesperson said.

Salih Khater, in an image posted on Facebook in 2010 (Facebook)

“At the time of the arrest, there was nobody else in the vehicle, which has now been removed from the scene and searched. No weapons have been recovered at this stage.

“At this early stage, there is no intelligence of further danger to Londoners or the rest of the UK in connection with this incident.”

No other arrests have been made in connection with the ongoing investigation.

A man and a woman were taken to hospital with non-life threatening injuries after the crash early on Tuesday morning, and have now both been discharged. Another man was also treated at the scene.

Detectives have released images of the Ford Fiesta involved as they appeal for help tracing its moments before the incident.

Police said the privately-owned car, registration number FL10 CWZ, travelled from Birmingham to London late on Monday night and arrived in the capital just after midnight.

It was in the Tottenham Court Road area from approximately 1.25am until 5.55am. It was then driven around the Westminster and Whitehall area from around 6am until the crash at 7.37am.

Footage showed the car sharply swerving through several cyclists and pedestrians, over central reservations and down the wrong side of the road at high speed before crashing into security barriers.

Police officers guarding the area had to leap out of the car’s path before armed colleagues rushed to detain the driver.

It came during parliament’s summer recess and ahead of the daily rush of tourists to the area, leaving it relatively deserted.

Police cordons erected amid a large-scale security response to the crash have since been lifted, but uniformed and plain-clothed officers have been deployed in central London under Project Servator.

Officials said they have “specialist skills to recognise tell-tale signs that that someone may be in an area for terrorist or other criminal purposes”.

Mr Khater describes himself as a shop manager on his Facebook page, where the “about” section reads: “In past I'm great but now I say I don't no [sic]”.

He said he studied at Sudan University of Science and Technology and went to school in Wad Madani, a city south-east of Khartoum.

Mr Khater's page shows a mixture of connections based mainly in Sudan, Birmingham and Nottingham – the two cities that are now the focus of operations by counterterror police.

Investigators have searched his former flat above a row of shops in Sparkbrook, near where the first Westminster attacker Khalid Masood lived.

The area was the home of several terrorists, including UK’s first suicide bomber, its first al-Qaeda plotter, one of one of the financiers of the 9/11 atrocity and several extremists who went to fight for Isis.

Metropolitan Police Assistant Commissioner Neil Basu, the head of UK counterterror policing, said the suspect was not known to MI5 or counterterror police.

Theresa May vowed that terrorists would “never succeed” in dividing Britain, after Donald Trump took to Twitter to blame “crazy animals” for the attack.

(EPA)

It struck just metres from where Masood stabbed a police officer to death after running down four pedestrians on nearby Westminster Bridge in March 2017, in the first terror attack claimed by Isis in the UK.

Metropolitan Police Commissioner Cressida Dick said the area could be pedestrianised in a bid to ward off vehicle attacks, amid a fresh review of security around the Houses of Parliament.

In the past 17 months, Westminster has been hit by two attacks and was the planned location of four disrupted plots, making it currently the biggest since terror target in Britain.

Ms Dick said: “Whether that area outside should be pedestrianised further, there should be further physical works done, I think is a matter that will be discussed no doubt between parliamentary authorities, us, the intelligence agencies and indeed the local authorities and the mayor.”

She said vehicles had “become a weapon of choice” for terrorists, following a spate of similar attacks across Europe.

Isis has issued advice to its followers non how to carry out atrocities using vehicles, knives and other easily obtained items, which have made attack plans faster and harder to spot for authorities.​

At a briefing for journalists in Westminster, the prime minister’s spokesman said 13 Islamist and four far-right plots have been foiled since the first Westminster attack in March 2017 – an average of one a month.

A total of 676 terrorism investigations by MI5 and counterterrorism police were underway by the end of June this year, up from around 500 just four months before.

Police are appealing to anyone who may have seen the vehicle or the driver either in the Tottenham Court Road or Westminster areas to contact them on 0800 789 321.

Anyone with footage or images of the incident is asked to send them to the investigation team via http://www.ukpoliceimageappeal.co.uk/