The worst injured 7/7 survivor says security services must be held to greater account - after a Manchester Arena attack review exposed failings echoing 2005 s mistakes.
There was no attempt to track down his friend salman who sent texts about martyrdom. when abdallah s phone was seized, abedi s telephone number was on that phone, it was identified as a distinct phone number, but no further investigative work was done to figure out who that person was. for me, it is again another missed opportunity. m15 knew that he was visiting abdallah. does the detail of what was in those messages, had they been ascribed back to abedi, possibly change our view of the intensity of the contact that he was having and the nature of the contact that he was having with abdallah? i think probably yes. in 2015 and 2016, salman abedi s name cropped up during investigations into extremists in manchester.
To protect through violence, through willingness to take up arms, is linked to being a hero, a good man. following his trips to libya, salman abedi became increasingly withdrawn, the partying stopped, he was seen in the street outside his home chanting prayers and wearing robes. he argued with fellow muslims who condemned is. he intensified his contact with this man, abdalraouf abdallah, who had also fought in libya. the pair exchanged hundreds of texts, in some of them salman abedi talked of martyrdom. abdallah was laterjailed for trying to recruit fighters for is. salman abedi visited him in prison. abdallah gave evidence at the arena inquiry. i didn t play any part of radicalisation or anything, and again, just to tell you that my fight was against