Timeline of major terror attacks in Britain

Published June 4, 2017
Women stand at a police cordon set up in London.─AFP
Women stand at a police cordon set up in London.─AFP

Six victims were killed in a terror attack in central London, and the three attackers were shot dead by armed police, police said Sunday.

It was the latest in a string of terror strikes in London and elsewhere in Britain in recent years:

Manchester Arena bombing

May, 2017: A suicide bomber blows himself outside a pop concert by teen idol Ariana Grande in Manchester in northwest England, killing 22 people and injuring 116.

Seven of the victims were under the age of 18.

The attack was carried out by 22-year-old Salman Abedi, a Manchester-born university drop-out of Libyan origin. The attack was claimed by the militant Islamic State (IS) group.

Westminster Bridge attack

March 22, 2017: Five people are killed and more than 50 wounded when a man rams his car into pedestrians on Westminster bridge in London before crashing into the barriers surrounding parliament and then stabbing a police officer to death.

The attacker, 52-year-old British Muslim convert Khalid Mahmood, is shot dead by police at the scene. Investigators describe the lone-wolf attack as “Islamist related terrorism”.

Lawmaker murdered

June 16, 2016: British Labour lawmaker Jo Cox is shot and stabbed to death by a pro-Nazi sympathiser just days before the historic vote to leave the EU.

Far-right white nationalist Thomas Mair is later sentenced to life in prison for her murder.

London underground stabbing

December 5, 2015: A paranoid schizophrenic stabs two people at London's Leytonstone Underground station, two days after Britain's first air strikes on IS in Syria.

The knifeman, Somali-born Muhaydin Mire, 30, is sentenced to life behind bars. The police say the incident is a “terrorist” attack.

British soldier slain

May 22, 2013: British soldier Lee Rigby, 25, is hacked to death by two Britons of Nigerian descent near an army barracks in London.

Witnesses say the attackers encouraged them to film the scene and yelled religious slogans before being injured and arrested by police.

In February 2014, Michael Adebolajo, 29, is sentenced to life in prison for the murder while Michael Adebowale, 22, receives a minimum of 45 years behind bars.

Northern Ireland shootings

March 2009: The month saw a sudden resurgence of political violence in Northern Ireland with two soldiers shot dead outside their barracks by republican militants as they went to collect a pizza delivery, the first such slaying since 1997.

Two days later a police officer is shot dead by a different paramilitary republican faction.

Glasgow airport attack

June 30, 2007: Two men in a burning vehicle ram into the main terminal of Glasgow Airport in Scotland.

An Indian driving the car suffers serious burns and later dies.

The passenger, Iraqi doctor Bilal Abdulla, 29, is jailed in December for at least 32 years for plotting to murder hundreds of people.

Suicide bombers hit London transport

July 7, 2005: Four British suicide bombers inspired by Al Qaeda attack London's Underground network and a bus during rush hour, killing 52 people, as well as themselves, and wounding 700.

It was the deadliest attack on British soil since a Pan Am airliner blew up over the Scottish town of Lockerbie, killing a total of 270 people including 11 on the ground, in 1988.

The London attack took place just a day after the city was awarded the 2012 Olympics.

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