London terror attack before vote leaves 7 dead, many hurt

Bloomberg

Seven people were killed in an attack on a popular London nightlife spot as terrorism struck Britain for the second time in as many weeks, just days before a national election.
A van swerved into Saturday-night crowds on London Bridge, before three men got out and went on a stabbing rampage through nearby bars. Metropolitan Police Commissioner Cressida Dick said seven members of the public and the three attackers had been killed, while 48 people had been injured.
“We believe that this incident is under control,” Dick told reporters in London on Sunday. “We have a very large investigation ongoing and we will be seeking to establish whether anyone else was working with, or helping with, the planning of this attack.” Prime Minister Theresa May has called an emergency meeting of security officials and ministers early on Sunday. She will make a statement at 10 a.m in London, according to the BBC.
The attack comes as campaigning for the June 8 election enters its final stages with the country still reeling from two other terror attacks this year, most recently the killing of 22 people, including children, at a pop concert in Manchester.

Foreign Wars
While it’s not clear how the attacks—the worst terrorist incidents on UK soil since 2005—will affect the election, security and Britain’s role in foreign wars have become more prominent campaign issues since the Manchester attack.
No one has claimed responsibility for the killings on Saturday, which bore similarities to an attack in March, when a lone assailant rammed into pedestrians on Westminster Bridge and then stabbed a police officer outside Parliament. IS claimed the Westminster and the Manchester attacks, and has traditionally encouraged followers to carry out strikes during the holy month of Ramadan.
President Donald Trump wasted no time in using the attack to urge US courts to reinstate his travel ban focused on people from predominantly Muslim countries. “We need to be smart, vigilant and tough. We need the courts to give us back our rights. We need the Travel Ban as an extra level of safety,” Trump said on Twitter. He later phoned May and offered condolences for the “brutal terror attacks,” according to a White House statement.

Narrow Streets
The incident started shortly after 10 p.m. when a van swerved off the road on London Bridge into a crowd of pedestrians, police said. The vehicle continued to Borough Market, a warren of narrow streets that’s popular with tourists and full of bars. There, the three men went on stabbing spree before being shot dead by police.
“They were running, a police officer was trying to put himself between them and the crowd,” Gabriele Sciotto, a photographer who took pictures of the suspects after they were shot, told the BBC. “In around two or five seconds, they shot all three men down.”
In the hours after the attack, officers moved to clear the pubs and bars in the area, while checking for more attackers. Customers were led out through the police cordon with their hands on their heads, television footage showed.
The Conservative Party, opposition Labour Party, Liberal Democrats, Scottish National Party and the Green Party suspended national campaigning for Thursday’s election. Local campaigning will continue. London’s Mayor Sadiq Khan told the BBC that more police officers would be deployed in the streets on Sunday.

Southeast Asian defense chiefs sound alarm on terror threat
Bloomberg

Southeast Asian defense officials are urging greater regional security cooperation to counter what they say is the growing threat of IS-linked extremists.
The need to contain terrorist activity in the region was a common refrain among the defense ministers and top brass at the three-day Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, Asia’s most high-profile security conference. The host country’s defense chief, Ng Eng Hen, warned on Sunday that terrorism was the region’s “biggest security concern” and said the potential of IS fighters returning was growing as they lose ground in the middle east.
The warnings came amid condolences for the U.K. as news reports rolled in about the latest terrorist attack in London. Philippines Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana was not at the summit, electing to stay home after President Rodrigo Duterte declared martial law to fight IS-linked militants in the southern city of Marawi.