[Salman] Abedi was given at least £7,000 from the
taxpayer-funded Student Loans Company
Taxpayer-funded
student loans and other forms of government welfare were used to finance Salman
Abedi’s suicide bombing attack in Manchester, according to police.
From The
Telegraph:
[Salman] Abedi
was given at least £7,000 from the taxpayer-funded Student Loans Company after
beginning a business administration degree at Salford University in October
2015.
It is thought
he received a further £7,000 in the 2016 academic year even though by then he
had already dropped out of the course. Salford University declined to say if it
had informed the Student Loans Company that Abedi’s funding should have been
stopped.
Separately, the
Department for Work and Pensions refused to say if Abedi had received any
benefits, including housing benefit and income support worth up to £250 a week,
during 2015 and 2016. It would only say he was not claiming benefits in the
weeks before the attack.
Abedi, 22,
never held down a job, according to neighbours and friends, but was able to
travel regularly between the UK and Libya.
Abedi also had
sufficient funds to buy materials for his sophisticated bomb while living in a
rented house in south Manchester.
Six weeks
before the bombing Abedi rented a second property in a block of flats in
Blackley eight miles from his home, paying £700 in cash.
He had enough
money to rent a third property in the centre of Manchester from where he set
off with a backpack containing the bomb.
Abedi also
withdrew £250 in cash three days before the attack and transferred £2,500 to
his younger brother Hashim in Libya, who is accused of knowing about the attack
in advance.
This same scam
is being run again and again:
David Videcette,
a former Metropolitan police detective who worked on the 7/7 London bombing
investigation, said of the student loans’ system: “It is an easy way for a
terrorist to move forward and finance their activities at the expense of the
taxpayer.
“All you have got
to do is get yourself into university and then off you go. Often they have go
no intention of turning up.”
Professor
Anthony Glees, director of Buckingham University’s Centre for Security and
Intelligence Studies, said: “The British system makes funds readily available
to jihadist students without checks on them. There needs to be an inquiry into
this.”
Abedi father
and brother were both arrested on suspicion of being involved in the attack.
Abedi’s brother
reportedly spoke to him “minutes” before the attack.
22 people,
including many children, were killed in Monday’s attack and dozens more were
injured.
Not mentioned
in this report is that Abedi’s parents were accepted into the UK as so-called
“refugees” from Libya, which no doubt entailed their family collecting tens of
thousands more pounds in welfare.
