MI5 could not have prevented Fishmongers’ Hall attack

A senior figure at MI5 has told the inquest into the Fishmongers’ Hall attack that the Security Service could not have prevented Usman Khan’s deadly attack.

Having come under scrutiny once it was revealed that MI5 has assessed that Khan’s threat level increased in the months leading up to it, an anonymous MI5 officer referred to as Witness A told an inquest into the deaths Jack Merritt and Saskia Jones in November 2019 that an intelligence service review of the attack concluded MI5’s actions were ‘sound’.

MI5 increased Khan’s threat level from P4 to P3 after he was released from high-security prison in December 2018. P3 refers to individuals ‘that require further action to determine whether they pose a threat’.

MI5 was made aware that Khan had been invited to a prisoner education event organised by the University of Cambridge’s Learning Together organisation in August 2019 but it was not told it was taking place in Fishmongers’ Hall until 22 November, a week before the attack. Police and probation officers responsible for the management of Khan told the inquest they were not aware MI5 was monitoring Khan or that its officers attended multi-agency public protection arrangements (Mappa) meetings about him in 2019.

Witness A confirmed that in July 2019 MI5 objected to Khan being allowed to attend a course to learn how to operate a dumper truck, because of fears he could use a heavy vehicle as a terrorist weapon.

Asked why MI5 did not raise similar objections about the Fishmongers’ Hall event, Witness A said: “At that time there was not intelligence that he was engaged in terrorist activity. So there was no intelligence to feed in.”