LONDON: Britain’s election campaign resumed in earnest on Monday with Prime Minister Theresa May’s opinion poll lead narrowing and the focus firmly on her security record after an attack by marauding militants killed seven people in the heart of London.
In Britain’s third militant attack in as many months, three men rammed a van into pedestrians on London Bridge on Saturday night before running into the bustling Borough Market area, where they slit throats and stabbed people indiscriminately.
All three attackers were shot dead by police, who made at least a dozen arrests in east London on Sunday and carried out further raids on Monday morning.
The attackers’ identities are known but have not been disclosed.
“This was an attack on London and the United Kingdom, but it was also an attack on the free world,” May said.
A Canadian and a French national were among those who died, while the 48 injured included people of many nationalities. Eighteen people remained in a critical condition.
Britain has received messages of solidarity from numerous world leaders including Donald Trump, although the US president also struck a discordant note by issuing tweets criticising London Mayor Sadiq Khan.
Trump accused Khan of making a “pathetic excuse” for saying on Sunday morning that Londoners should not be alarmed. A spokesman for Khan had noted in response to an earlier Trump tweet that Khan’s comment referred to the increased police presence on London’s streets. May said Khan was doing a good job and it was wrong to say anything else.
A parliamentary election takes place on Thursday and May’s spokeswoman said the government was working closely with police on security for the vote.
Saturday’s rampage took place less than two weeks after a suicide bomber killed 22 children and adults at a concert in Manchester. In March, five people died after a man drove a van into pedestrians on London’s Westminster Bridge and stabbed a policeman.
New security barriers were in place on Monday morning on several bridges in central London, including Westminster Bridge.
With the London attack dominating attention, a reduction in the number of police officers in England and Wales by almost 20,000 during May’s six years as interior minister from 2010 to 2016 shot to the top of the election agenda.
“It’s just a fact that, over the last seven years, we as a city have lost 600 million pounds from our budgets. We have had to close police stations, sell police buildings, and we’ve lost thousands of police staff,” said London Mayor Khan, who is from the opposition Labour Party.
May did not answer repeated questions from reporters on the cutbacks but said counter-terrorism budgets had been protected and police had the powers they needed.
Her main opponent, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, backed calls for her resignation over the police cuts.
He said many people were “very worried that she was at the Home Office for all this time, presided over these cuts in police numbers, and now is saying that we have a problem”.
May hit back by criticising Corbyn, a pacifist who has opposed some security legislation in parliament and expressed reservations in the past about police responding to armed attackers with “shoot-to-kill” tactics. May’s Conservative Party’s lead over Labour has narrowed markedly from 20 points or more when she called the election in April to a range between one and 12 points now, although the Conservatives are still widely expected to win a majority.
— Reuters
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