New arrests over Woolwich soldier murder as MI5 faces new questions

Updated

Three men have been arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to murder the British soldier who was hacked to death in a London street last week.

Two men, aged 24 and 28, were arrested at a residential address in south-east London, while a 21-year-old man was arrested on a street, police said in a statement.

Tasers were used on the 28-year-old and the 21-year-old, police added. Neither suspect needed hospital treatment.

All three were taken to a south London police station on Saturday night (local time) while officers searched four residential addresses in the city's south-east.

Drummer Lee Rigby, 25, who survived a tour of duty in Afghanistan, was killed outside the Royal Artillery Barracks in Woolwich, south-east London, on Wednesday.

Two men, 28-year-old Michael Adebolajo and 22-year-old Michael Adebowale, remain under armed guard in hospital after being shot and arrested by police on suspicion of murder.

Britain's domestic security service MI5 will report to a parliamentary inquiry this week on what it knew about the two murder suspects.

Media reports say the men were known to MI5 and the BBC has interviewed a man who claims the intelligence services actively tried to recruit Adebolajo.

A friend of Adebolajo, Abu Nusaybah, told the BBC's Newsnight program the approach was turned down. There has been no official confirmation or denial of the report.

Shortly after the interview had concluded, Mr Nusaybah was arrested by counter-terrorism officers on BBC premises.

London's Metropolitan Police said officers arrested a 31-year-old man on Saturday evening (local time) on "suspicion of the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism".

MPs to investigate security services' role

This week, Britain's parliamentary intelligence and security committee will get a written report laying out what MI5 knew about the two suspects.

Prime minister David Cameron has said the committee will investigate the security services' role.

Asked about Mr Nusaybah's comments, a spokesman for the Home Office department said it never commented on security matters.

Three days after Drummer Rigby's killing, police have yet to bring any charges.

A 29-year-old man arrested on Thursday on suspicion of conspiracy to murder has been bailed to return to a police station pending further enquiries.

Police said Adebolajo and Adebowale are in a stable condition in hospital.

The pair are in "no fit state" to be questioned by police, a government source was quoted as saying in The Times newspaper.

Witnesses said two men used a car to run down Drummer Rigby outside the Woolwich barracks and then attacked him with a meat cleaver and knives.

The pair told bystanders they were acting in revenge for British wars in Muslim countries.

Meanwhile, a French soldier patrolling a neighbourhood west of Paris has been stabbed in the neck by a man who fled the scene.

President Francois Hollande says "at this stage" there is no apparent link between this attack and the London murder.

ABC/BBC/wires

Topics: murder-and-manslaughter, crime, law-crime-and-justice, terrorism, united-kingdom

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