MI5 criticised in Manchester Arena report

The public inquiry into the bombing of Manchester Arena in May 2017 released the third volume of its report today, focusing on the radicalisation of the bomber Salman Abedi, and the preventability of the attack, which killed 22 people.

On the latter issue, the report states that a significant opportunity was missed by MI5:

24.53 Witness X was initially the corporate witness for the Security Service and, in that capacity, provided an open witness statement. For good reason, Witness X was subsequently unable to give evidence and their witness statement was adopted by Witness J. That statement set out that on two separate occasions in the months prior to the Attack, intelligence was received by the Security Service, the significance of which was not fully appreciated at the time. I shall refer to these as ‘Piece of Intelligence 1’ and ‘Piece of Intelligence 2’

The inquiry concludes that fuller reporting on 'Piece of Intelligence 1' would not have been decisive, but chairman Sir John Saunders goes on to state:

24.81 In my view, Piece of Intelligence 2 gave rise to the real possibility of obtaining information that might have led to actions which prevented the Attack. We cannot know what would have happened, but there is at least the material possibility that opportunities to intervene were missed.

Saunders gave greater weight to this intelligence than previous reviews of the attack, in part because he was able to interview officers directly involved:

24.28 The witnesses who gave direct factual evidence to me during the closed hearing were able to offer real insight into their thought processes at the time. On occasion, it became apparent that the Security Service’s corporate position did not reflect what those officers did, thought or would have done at the material time. Rather, the corporate position was more by way of a retrospective justification for the actions taken or not taken.

While the report is inevitably an exercise in hindsight, it does shed some new light on such perennial issues such as MI5-police co-operation:

24.148 It was clear from the evidence I heard that the Security Service and Counter Terrorism Policing have a close partnership and that there is every intention from both organisations to work together as smoothly and effectively as possible. In his open evidence, Witness J stated: “[F]rom my experience, we have a fantastically strong relationship and partnership and we work very well together, but that doesn’t stop us two organisations continually searching for ways to work more closely and better together.”

24.149 Despite this, in the course of the Inquiry’s investigation, several examples of communication failures have been found, only some of which are summarised in Volume 3 (open). 

24.150 These problems appeared to me to emerge from the systems used by the Security Service and Counter Terrorism Policing to communicate with each other. Both the Security Service and Counter Terrorism Policing accepted in their closed closing statements that there were difficulties with the current systems and were receptive to recommendations that might assist in reducing or resolving these difficulties. 

The report also questions the extent to which combatants returning from Libya, were a lower priority than those returning from Syria, concluding that the threshold for investigation was too high.

24.132 It is entirely understandable that the Security Service viewed some returnees from Syria as a greater threat to national security than equivalent returnees from Libya at that time. However, the focus on Syria meant that both the Security Service and CTPNW underestimated the risk from Libya in 2017. 

24.133 To have ‘run the intelligence machine’ to investigate every person returning from Libya would have been impractical at that time, according to the Security Service witnesses, because there were legitimate reasons to visit Libya. It was necessary, for practical reasons as well as other reasons, for there to be some particular indicators that would cause the fact of somebody’s return from Libya to be treated with concern by the Security Service.

One can't help wondering whether the greater threshold also owed something to the complex history of British intelligence in Libya, involving contacts which Islamists which included elements of back-channel diplomacy, but also according to some allegations, the darker side of covert action.

In the 1990s, there were claims that MI6 was working with the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group against the Gadaffi regime, only to effectively change sides during the War on Terror, before shifting again in the wake of the Arab Spring.