Two London terror suspects named; one had been in TV show about extremists

Police on Monday named two of the three men behind the London terror attack, saying one was known to security services, but that there had been no intelligence about an attack.

Khuram Shazad Butt was 27 and a British citizen born in Pakistan, police said in a statement.

“Khuram Shazad Butt was known to the police and MI5. However, there was no intelligence to suggest that this attack was being planned and the investigation had been prioritized accordingly,” police said.

He appeared in a Channel 4 documentary, entitled, “The Jihadis Next Door,” about British extremists, that was broadcast last year, British media reported.

Redouane was 30 and “claimed to be Moroccan and Libyan”. Police said he also used the name of Rachid Elkhdar and a different date of birth that gave his age as 25.

“I would urge anyone with information about these men, their movements in the days and hours before the attack and the places they frequented to come forward,” national counter-terrorism police chief Mark Rowley said in the statement.

“At any one time MI5 and police are conducting around 500 active investigations, involving 3,000 subjects of interest.

“Additionally, there are around 20,000 individuals who are former subjects of interest, whose risk remains subject to review by MI5 and its partners,” he said.

Rowley said the security services had stopped 18 plots since 2013, including five since the Westminster attack two months ago.

Police said they now had 10 people in custody after releasing two of the 12 people arrested on Sunday.

The threat level in the UK is to remain at “severe,” Prime Minister Theresa May said, indicating that another attack is highly likely.

In addition, May said that she supports the “shoot to kill” policy used by London police in responding to terror attacks, adding that police saved “countless lives” by killing the three attackers within eight minutes on Saturday night.

British counterterrorism investigators searched two homes and detained “a number” of people as part of the investigation.

Dozens were injured, many of them critically, in the terror attack that started on the London Bridge, when three attackers swerved the vehicle into pedestrians, and then, armed with knives, rampaged through Borough Market, slashing and stabbing anyone they could find.

The three men, who wore fake suicide vests, were shot to death by police. The Islamic State group has claimed responsibility.