LONDON — President Donald Trump, viewed by many here as an American bull in the proverbial china shop, was especially diplomatic on Tuesday, as he promised to “stay out” of British politics, just 10 days before a general election.
But he couldn’t quite help himself.
Trump also declared that his ally Prime Minister Boris Johnson is “very capable and I think he’ll do a good job” if elected on Dec. 12.
As for Johnson’s opponent, Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, the president on Tuesday said, “I can work with anybody.”
A month ago, in a call-in to Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage’s radio show, Trump warned Britain that Corbyn would be “so bad for your country, so bad.”
Trump claimed, “He’d take you in such a bad way.”
Sitting next to NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg at a one-on-one meeting between the two leaders Tuesday morning, Trump turned a photo-op into a 50-minute impromptu news conference.
Mostly, Trump spoke about NATO and his feelings about French President Emmanuel Macron.
Trump slammed as “very, very nasty” and “very disrespectful” recent comments by his French counterpart about the diminished state of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization alliance.
In his side remarks Tuesday, Trump was asked if he thought that Britain’s government-run National Health Service should be on the table in future US-UK trade deals.
“No, not at all, I have nothing to do with it. Never even thought about it, honestly,” Trump said.
“I don’t even know where that rumor started. We have absolutely nothing to do with it and we wouldn’t want to if you handed it to us on a silver platter, we want nothing to do with it.”
The rumor may have started with Trump and his ambassador to Britain, Woody Johnson, owner of the New York Jets.
Johnson told the BBC on June 2 that all areas of the British economy, including the NHS and food, would be “on the table” in any future trade talks.
Trump echoed the point two days later.
During a news conference in London on June 4, when asked whether the NHS would be involved in a possible trade deal with the United States, Trump said, “When you’re dealing on trade, everything is on the table — so NHS or anything else, and a lot more than that. Everything will be on the table, absolutely.”
Trump has since backtracked, possibly aware of what a hot-button issue this is in Britain.
In his phone-in with Farage a month ago, Trump said, “It’s not for us to have anything to do with your health-care system.”
The British prime minister, in the closing days of an election he is forecast to win, has sought to keep Trump at arm’s length.
On Friday, Johnson tried to dissuade the American president from offering his opinions on domestic affairs. “What we don’t do traditionally as loving allies and friends, what we don’t do traditionally, is get involved in each other’s election campaigns,” Johnson told LBC radio.
Johnson on Tuesday stated that he could “categorically rule out” that “any part of the NHS will be on the table in any trade negotiations,” including Amercian pharmecueticals.
The prime minister also called Corbyn’s warning that Johnson and Trump had formed an alliance to sell out the NHS, as “pure Loch Ness Monster, Bermuda Triangle stuff.”
Asked if Trump’s support was a possible embarrassment, Johnson said, “On the contrary, and I have good relations with Washington, the president, with President Macron, Chancellor Merkel, and that’s vital for the U.K. And we’ll be having a series of meetings — bilateral, trilateral of all kinds — in the course of the next couple of days.”
Trump said he would be meeting with Johnson at 10 Downing Street later in the trip.
US President Donald Trump has said he could "work with anybody" in No 10 - nine days ahead of a general election.
Speaking on a three-day visit to the UK, Mr Trump said he would "stay out of the election", that he was a "fan of Brexit" and he thought PM Boris Johnson was "very capable".
Mr Trump is in the UK for a Nato summit being held in Watford on Wednesday.
He will attend a reception hosted by the Queen at Buckingham Palace later, where protests are expected.
The US President was speaking during a breakfast meeting with Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg at the US ambassador's residence in London.
Mr Trump also said the US wanted "absolutely nothing to do with" the NHS, when asked if it would form any part of future trade talks. He added: "Never even thought about it, honestly."
And he said the US was "trying to work something out" with the family of teenager Harry Dunn, who was killed after a collision with a car driven by a US diplomat's wife who has since returned home, claiming diplomatic immunity.
His comments came moments after he told reporters that he was staying out of the election on 12 December "because I don't want to complicate it".
President Trump is visiting the UK to attend a Nato summit commemorating the 70th anniversary of the transatlantic organisation.
He is due to have separate talks with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron.
He will attend a working lunch with representatives from Estonia, Greece, Latvia, Poland, Romania, Lithuania, Bulgaria and the UK.
However, it is unclear whether Mr Trump will hold a one-on-one meeting with Mr Johnson.
Mr Trump said he would be meeting the British prime minister during his visit, adding: "I have meetings set up with lots of different countries".
However, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab - who will meet US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo later - said arrangements for such bilateral meetings were "always quite fluid".
He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "The role of this leaders' summit - and we're hosting it - is for the prime minister to bring all of our north American and European partners together and show, through Nato, we can be bigger than the sum of our parts."
BBC diplomatic correspondent James Lansdale said the Conservatives' HQ wanted to avoid such a meeting "to avoid pictures that could be used by his (Boris Johnson's) opponents" in the upcoming general election.
Mr Johnson and Mr Trump did speak on Saturday, when Mr Trump expressed his condolences after the London Bridge attack.
Mr Trump later said he was "absolutely cognisant" of the importance of not interfering in other countries' elections.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has called for Mr Trump to be treated with "with respect and politeness" during his visit.
Mr Corbyn has written to Mr Trump, demanding assurances that the NHS will be "off the table" in any post-Brexit US-UK trade talks. However, Mr Johnson said the claims were "nonsense" and the NHS would not be part of any such trade discussions.
Meanwhile, Mr Johnson has told the Sun newspaper that Mr Corbyn wants to "disband" Nato and accused the Labour leader of being "naive" to the risk of terrorism.
In response, a Labour spokesman said that Mr Corbyn "will do whatever is necessary and effective to keep the British people safe".
Leaders including Mr Trump and Mr Corbyn will gather for a reception at Buckingham Palace later.
Protesters are expected to gather outside the palace ahead of the event on Tuesday evening.
The family of Harry Dunn - the teenage motorcyclist, whose death has led to a diplomatic row with the US - will be among those demonstrating, a family spokesman has said.
Mr Dunn died after a collision with a car driven by a US diplomat's wife, who has since left the UK claiming diplomatic immunity.
Radd Seiger said Mr Dunn's parents and friends will "make our feelings known" to Mr Trump.
Donald Trump has arrived in the UK for a three-day visit, which will include a meeting of the defence alliance Nato.
The US president, who landed at Stansted airport on Monday night, is set to attend a reception for world leaders hosted by the Queen at Buckingham Palace later.
The summit marking the 70th anniversary of Nato starts in Watford on Wednesday.
Mr Trump's last two UK visits attracted protests and more demonstrations are expected during this stay.
President Trump is due to have separate talks with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Emmanuel Macron and Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg.
And he will attend a working lunch with representatives from Estonia, Greece, Latvia, Poland, Romania, Lithuania, Bulgaria and the UK.
It is unclear whether there will be a one-on-one meeting between UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Mr Trump.
Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab - who will meet US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo later - said arrangements for such bilateral meetings were "always quite fluid".
He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "The role of this leaders' summit - and we're hosting it - is for the prime minister to bring all of our north American and European partners together and show, through Nato, we can be bigger than the sum of our parts."
Mr Johnson and Mr Trump did speak on Saturday, when Mr Trump expressed his condolences after the London Bridge attack.
Meanwhile, Mr Johnson has told the Sun newspaper that Mr Corbyn wants to "disband" Nato and accused the Labour leader of being "naive" to the risk of terrorism.
In response, a Labour spokesman said that Mr Corbyn "will do whatever is necessary and effective to keep the British people safe".
U.S. President Donald Trump and Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson arrive for a bilateral meeting during the G7 summit on August 25, 2019 in Biarritz, France.
Stefan Rousseau | Pool | Getty Images
President Donald Trump's arrival in the U.K. just 10 days before Britons head to the ballot box could spell trouble for Prime Minister Boris Johnson, political analysts told CNBC.
The U.S. president, who is scheduled to arrive in London on Monday, is likely to be pressed to comment on a range of hyper-sensitive political issues — ranging from the National Health Service (NHS) to prospective trade talks.
Britons head to the ballot box on Dec. 12, in a vote likely to decide both the fate of the U.K.'s departure from the European Union and the future direction of the world's fifth-largest economy.
Johnson has urged Trump not to get involved in the upcoming election, fearing he could say something that threatens to derail the Conservative Party's campaign.
"What we don't do traditionally as loving allies and friends, what we don't do traditionally, is get involved in each other's election campaigns," Johnson, who's center-right party currently holds a commanding lead in the latest opinion polls, told LBC radio on Friday.
The sitting prime minister also said he would walk out of trade talks with the U.S. if the health service was a pre-condition to negotiations.
Beware of the 'bogeyman'
Trump has typically been unafraid to comment on a wide range of U.K. election issues, with Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn often quick to use the U.S. president's praise of Johnson as a key attack line against the Conservatives.
In recent months, Trump has suggested Johnson and Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage would form an "unstoppable force" if they formed a cross-party alliance, claimed Corbyn would be "so bad" for Britain and indicated that the NHS would, in fact, be "on the table" during prospective trade talks.
He has even warned that Johnson's Brexit deal might ultimately block a much sought-after trade deal between the U.S. and the U.K.
"He's a bit of a bogeyman," Matthew Oxenford, lead U.K. and Brexit analyst at the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), told CNBC via telephone.
Opposition Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn (C) poses with NHS workers holding documents regarding the Conservative government's UK-US trade talks in London after a press conference on November 27, 2019.
TOLGA AKMEN | AFP | Getty Images
A lot of external commentators have offered their opinion on U.K. politics in recent weeks, Oxenford said, citing the outgoing European Council President Donald Tusk and former U.S. presidential candidate Hilary Clinton.
But, when it comes to Trump, the "biggest issue" was clearly likely to be the NHS, Oxenford said.
On a state visit to the U.K. earlier this year, the U.S. president suggested that the NHS — which has provided free healthcare at the point of use for more than 70 years — would be up for grabs during post-Brexit trade talks.
Standing alongside former prime minister Theresa May in June, Trump told reporters: "Look, I think everything with a trade deal is on the table."
"When you're dealing in trade everything is on the table. So, NHS or anything else, or a lot more than that — but everything will be on the table, absolutely."
An overwhelming majority of Brits reject his politics, even as many realize that Britain without the United States is far weaker than with the United States in a 'Special Relationship.'
Brian Klaas
Professor of global politics at University College London
Trump has since sought to backtrack on his comments about the NHS, saying earlier this month that health would not feature in post-Brexit trade negotiations.
"Sometimes he says it will be on the table in trade talks, sometimes he says it won't be on the table. This confusion gives Labour an opportunity to use it as a good attack line," Oxenford said.
Key battleground
Corbyn has warned a Conservative-led trade deal with the U.S. could drive up the price of medicines, warning Johnson's party would sell-off parts of the health service to U.S. business after Brexit.
Johnson has repeatedly insisted the state-run NHS would not be on the table in any trade talks.
"Trump doesn't have a filter. It won't matter if his advisers tell him — or Boris pleads with him — not to speak about the election, the NHS, or what Britain will have to give up to the United States in a prospective trade deal," Brian Klaas, a professor of global politics at University College London, told CNBC via email.
"He also has a very limited understanding of British political sensitivities. In previous visits, it wasn't clear that he knew what the NHS was, let alone how sensitive it is for an American president to speak about it," he added.
President Donald Trump and Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May hold a joint news conference in London, Britain, June 4, 2019.
Carlos Barria | Reuters
The NHS is often a key battleground during an election period, with politicians quick to champion an institution that is celebrated across the country.
However, despite its recognition as one of Britain's most cherished institutions, problems associated with the NHS remain a regular feature of public discourse.
This includes near-constant concerns about a shortfall in funding, long waiting times for consultations and operations, cutbacks to social services, crumbling hospitals and staff shortages.
"Trump is, in general, a toxic political force in the U.K. An overwhelming majority of Brits reject his politics, even as many realize that Britain without the United States is far weaker than with the United States in a 'Special Relationship,'" Klaas said.
US-UK trade talks
The EIU's Oxenford said that given the U.S. president was "never one to refrain himself," he will "undoubtedly" wade into the U.K. election campaign during his visit to London.
"He is generally an unpopular figure in the U.K. so Johnson won't want to embrace him — but he can't ignore him either."
U.S. trade negotiators have set out their objectives for trade talks with the U.K., including "full market access" for U.S. pharmaceutical companies.
"The Conservatives are going to want Trump to keep as far out of the headlines as possible for the entirety of the election," Constantine Fraser, European political analyst at the TS Lombard research group, told CNBC via telephone.
Fraser said that the ruling Conservative Party was "desperately" trying to show the electorate that there were reasons to be optimistic about the country's scheduled departure from the world's largest trading bloc.
In doing so, the prospect of a future U.S.-U.K. trade deal has become a "symbolic and totemic issue."
LONDON — A deadly terror attack struck at the heart of the British capital just weeks before a crucial national election, refocusing the campaign on security issues as voters were set to head to the polls.
But two years later London Bridge was again the scene of tragedy, bravery and the center of national debate in the U.K. this weekend.
Nov. 30, 201901:57
Friday afternoon's stabbing attack left two people dead at the hands of a man released from prison last year after a previous terrorism conviction. Political leaders vowed to briefly pause campaigning, but by late Saturday it was clear security would — at least temporarily — become the focus of the election.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson vowed to take a tougher stance on crime and security if re-elected. Writing in an op-ed in the Mail on Sunday newspaper, Johnson called for the reversal of a law that allows serious offenders to be released from prison early and sought to blame the opposition Labour Party for the policy.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn criticized the government, which has been in power since 2010.
"There's got to be a very full investigation," he said, though he declined to join Johnson's sweeping call for longer prison terms.
The snap Dec. 12 vote was called in an effort to end the country's yearslong political deadlock over its divorce from the European Union.
The issue has dominated much of the campaign to this point, with Johnson's ruling Conservative Party appealing to voters to hand them a majority in Parliament they claim would allow them to "get Brexit done."
Labour has sought to focus on health care, claiming Johnson's hardline Brexit plans and vow to strike a free trade deal with the United States will do damage to the cherished National Health Service (NHS).
Let our news meet your inbox. The news and stories that matters, delivered weekday mornings.
"Inevitably, an attack like this is going to dictate the agenda for at least a few days," Tim Bale, a professor of politics at Queen Mary University of London, told NBC News.
"I’m not sure it will permanently knock Brexit, or indeed the NHS, off the headlines, but it's clear both Boris Johnson and to some extent Jeremy Corbyn are determined to not only comment on but potentially capitalize on what’s happened."
Corbyn, a veteran left-wing campaigner, has trailed in the polls throughout but looked to be narrowing the gap in the past week. PAUL ELLIS / AFP - Getty Images
Johnson's law-and-order stance was more likely to appeal to the British public, Bale said, which is "notoriously hardline and much more inclined to a lock them up and throw away the key philosophy."
A public opinion poll by market research firm YouGov for the Sunday Times newspaper found the public split in their confidence in Johnson on security issues, but overwhelmingly lacking confidence in Corbyn's leadership on the subject.
The Conservatives have long sought to paint their opponents as soft on crime, a tactic Johnson returned to in the wake of the London Bridge attack.
Johnson and his allies have attempted to blame a Labour Party policy from 2008 for the early release of Usman Khan, the 28-year-old named as the suspect police shot dead on London Bridge.
Khan was originally sentenced to 16 years in prison in 2012 for his part in an al-Qaeda-inspired plot to blow up the London Stock Exchange and other major sites including the U.S. Embassy.
But Bale said such a reduction of a complex case was "deeply cynical," while some U.K. legal experts pushed back against the claims.
The Prime Minister repeatedly defended his efforts Sunday to point the finger. "Although it is very early I think it is legitimate," he told the BBC's flagship Sunday talk show in a combative interview with host Andrew Marr.
Related
One of the families affected by Friday's attack appeared to have made an appeal not to exploit the incident to impose tougher laws.
One of the victims was identified Sunday as Jack Merritt, 25, who was part of Cambridge University's Learning Together program aimed at educating people in prison alongside university students.
Ahead of the attack Khan had been attending a Learning Together event at a historic building adjacent to the bridge, police said.
In a now-deleted tweet Jack's father, David Merritt, was reported to have said Saturday his son "would not wish his death to be used as the pretext for more draconian sentences or for detaining people unnecessarily."
That wish seemed to have fallen on deaf ears.
Yet it remained unclear whether the strategy would pay off when voters head to the polls in two weeks.
On that occasion Corbyn was able to gain public favor by criticizing policing cuts that had been imposed as part of the Conservative government's austerity program.
"I think the public did have some sympathy with the idea that you can’t protect people on the cheap and the point he made about police funding back then arguably applies now," Bale said.
While the laws involved in the case may require review, Bale warned that politicians should tread carefully as they quickly apportioned blame.
"Voters aren’t fools and if they begin to think that politicians are trying to make the most out of a tragic incident then it may backfire," he said, "because voters at the moment are very, very cynical about politicians on all sides."
Linda Givetash
Linda Givetash is a reporter based in London. She previously worked for The Canadian Press in Vancouver and Nation Media in Uganda.
Boris Johnson wrote that Britain's poorest communities "[supply] us with the chavs, the losers, the burglars, the drug addicts..."
In a newspaper column from 2005 unearthed by Business Insider, Johnson claimed that the poorest 20% live on "run-down estates" and only vote for Labour in the "deluded hope of bigger hand-outs."
Johnson also suggested in 2013 that economic inequality was inevitable due to lower intelligence among low-earners.
Labour's David Lammy accused the prime minister of showing 'disdain for working-class people.'
Boris Johnson wrote that the poorest 20% of British society is made-up of "chavs," "losers," "burglars," "drug addicts," and "criminals," in a newspaper column unearthed by Business Insider.
Johnson, who was a Conservative MP and editor of the Spectator magazine at the time, wrote in the Telegraph in 2005 that poorer voters who live on "run-down estates," only continued to vote for Labour due to the "deluded hope of bigger hand-outs."
He added that this "bottom" one-fifth of British citizens "supplies us with the chavs, the losers, the burglars, the drug addicts and the 70,000 people who are lost in our prisons and learning nothing except how to become more effective criminals."
In an aside aimed at his political opponents, he said that some Labour MPs only wanted to ban the smacking of children due to their "revulsion when they see a chav belting her kids in the supermarket."
Earlier this week, it emerged that Johnson had labelled the children of single mothers "ill-raised, ignorant, aggressive and illegitimate," and accused their fathers of being too "feeble" to "take control of [their] woman."
Labour's David Lammy told Business Insider that Johnson's comments revealed a "disdain for working-class people across the UK."
"Before becoming Prime Minister, Johnson used the privilege of high profile newspaper columns to spew bigoted abuse at Muslim women, black people, single mothers, working-class people and other groups.
"This history makes him unfit to be Prime Minister, especially at a time when our country is divided and desperately needs to come back together again."
The Conservative Party were contacted for comment.
Poverty is caused by low intelligence
Getty
Johnson has also previously claimed that income inequality may be inevitable due to the lower intelligence of some poorer people.
"Whatever you may think of the value of IQ tests," Johnson told the Centre for Policy Studies in 2013, "it is surely relevant to a conversation about inequality that as many as 16 per cent of our species have an IQ below 85 while about 2 per cent have an IQ above 130,"
Johnson argued that "I don't believe that economic equality is possible" because "human beings who are far from equal in raw ability."
Johnson refuses to apologise for offensive comments
As Business Insider previously revealed, in a 1998 Telegraph column about Peter Mandelson's resignation from the Labour government, Johnson said the announcement would lead to the blubbing of "tank-topped bumboys" in "the Ministry of Sound" nightclub, and "the soft-lit Soho drinking clubs frequented by Mandy and his pals."
He added that Mandelson's departure would cause the "lipstick" to come away from Blair's government.
In a separate Telegraph column, Johnson also bewailed attempts to increase equality at the BBC for gay people.
"It must be a spoof," he wrote.
"In my hand was a magazine from something called the BBC Resources Equal Opportunities Unit. There were letters from gays asking about their "partner's" right to a BBC pension."
In his 2001 book "Friends, Voters, Countrymen," Johnson compared gay marriage to bestiality, writing that "if gay marriage was OK – and I was uncertain on the issue – then I saw no reason in principle why a union should not be consecrated between three men, as well as two men, or indeed three men and a dog."
Asked about his record on Friday, Johnson refused to apologise and told LBC that his past comments had been taken out of context and were "absolute distortions" of what he had written.
"You just need to go back and look at the context," he told LBC's Nick Ferrari.
"So much of this stuff is disinterred with a view to distracting from the basic issues of this election."
Our Brexit Insider Facebook group is the best place for up-to-date news and analysis about Britain’s departure from the EU, direct from Business Insider’s political reporters. Join here.
Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Home Secretary Priti Patel visit the site of the London Bridge attacks with police chiefs on Saturday.
Photo:
simon dawson/Reuters
LONDON—The British government will review its sentencing policies after a convicted terrorist on early release from prison carried out a stabbing attack in the heart of London that left two people dead.
Police identified the attacker, who they shot dead on London Bridge on Friday, as 28-year-old Usman Khan. He had been convicted in 2012 for terrorism offenses and served time in prison for the part he played in a plot to bomb the London Stock Exchange in 2010. Three people were also injured in the attack, one seriously.
Authorities said that Mr. Khan appeared to have acted alone.
Terrorism Returns to London
A man fatally stabbed two people near London Bridge on Friday before being shot dead by police officers. The incident is the latest in a series of terrorist attacks in the heart of the city.
A witness saw the attacker emerging from Fishmongers’ Hall.
City of London
Southwark Bridge
Attacker tackled by bystanders, then shot dead by armed police.
Select terrorist attacks
in Central London
London Bridge
THE REGENT’S
PARK
River Thames
Coordinated suicide attacks* (2005)
Palace of
Westminster
(2017)
HYDE
PARK
Tower of
London
N
London Bridge
(2017, 2019)
Buckingham
Palace
1 mile
River Thames
Southwark
1 km
A witness saw the attacker emerging from Fishmongers’ Hall.
City of London
Southwark
Bridge
Attacker tackled by bystanders, then shot dead by armed police.
Select terrorist attacks
in Central London
London Bridge
River
Thames
THE REGENT’S
PARK
Coordinated suicide attacks* (2005)
Palace of
Westminster
(2017)
N
HYDE
PARK
Tower of
London
London Bridge
(2017, 2019)
Buckingham
Palace
1 mile
River Thames
Southwark
1 km
A witness saw the attacker emerging from Fishmongers’ Hall.
City of London
Southwark
Bridge
Attacker tackled by bystanders, then shot dead by armed police.
Select terrorist attacks
in Central London
London Bridge
River Thames
THE REGENT’S
PARK
Coordinated suicide attacks* (2005)
Palace of
Westminster
(2017)
N
HYDE
PARK
Tower of
London
London Bridge
(2017, 2019)
Buckingham
Palace
1 mile
River Thames
Southwark
1 km
A witness saw the attacker emerging from Fishmongers’ Hall.
City of London
Attacker tackled by bystanders, then shot dead by armed police.
London
Bridge
River Thames
N
Southwark
Select terrorist attacks
in Central London
THE REGENT’S
PARK
Coordinated suicide attacks* (2005)
Palace of
Westminster
(2017)
HYDE
PARK
Tower of
London
London Bridge
(2017, 2019)
Buckingham
Palace
1 mile
River Thames
1 km
*Four coordinated suicide attacks in Central London hit three underground trains (between Aldgate and Liverpool Street; Russell Square and King’s Cross St. Pancras; and Edgware Road and Paddington stations) and a double-decker bus at Tavistock Square.
Source: Google Earth (image)
He was released from prison in December 2018 under a set of conditions that included an internet ban, a curfew and limitations on his movements and meetings. He carried a GPS tag allowing the authorities to track his whereabouts.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson visited the scene of the attack Saturday, and criticized the early release of terrorists. “The practice of automatic early release, where you cut a sentence in half, simply isn’t working and you’ve got some very good evidence of how that isn’t working with this case,” he said. “When people are sentenced to a certain number of years in prison, they should serve every year of that sentence,” Mr. Johnson added.
Security officials said the attack reflected the difficulties of stopping less sophisticated attacks carried out by lone actors, even by people who are being monitored.
Mr. Khan was one of nine people who were imprisoned after pleading guilty to being part of a group that was plotting in 2010 to plant a pipe bomb in a toilet in the London Stock Exchange.
The group, which had been tracked by Britain’s internal security service MI5 in an operation code-named Guava, had also discussed sending letter bombs to other addresses, including to the home of Mr. Johnson, who was at the time mayor of London.
Mr. Khan admitted attending terror-attack planning meetings, fundraising for terrorism and possessing copies of the al Qaeda magazine Inspire.
Mr. Khan, who was 19 when he was arrested, was born in the U.K. to a family of immigrants from Pakistani-administered Kashmir and lived in the city of Stoke in the English Midlands.
The group behind the London Stock Exchange plot formed before Islamic State came to prominence and its turn to terrorism was instead inspired by the American-born Yemen-based cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, who was killed in a 2011 U.S. drone strike. The group was said by prosecutors to be carrying out the strategy used by al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.
Mr. Khan admitted plotting to set up a terrorist training camp on land his family owned in Pakistani-administered Kashmir, but the plans weren’t considered to have advanced very far before his arrest. Before he was sentenced by a judge in 2012, he wrote a letter saying he had repented of his terrorist views.
Friday’s attack came as Britons prepare to vote for a new government in a Dec. 12 election. The campaign, which has focused on the U.K.’s planned withdrawal from the European Union, was briefly suspended after the attack as Mr. Johnson returned to London, but resumed Saturday.
The attack took place inside Fishmongers’ Hall, a building on the northwestern end of London Bridge that is used for conferences. The Metropolitan Police Force, which serves London, confirmed that the attack took place during an event hosted by Learning Together, a University of Cambridge program that aims to rehabilitate prisoners through education.
Mr. Khan stabbed several people inside the building before being pursued onto London Bridge by some of those attending the event who were trying to stop him. A British Transport Police officer in plain clothes was also among those who assailed the attacker before armed police arrived, police said Saturday. Neil Basu, the Metropolitan Police’s head of counterterrorism, said there were “some incredible acts of bravery” especially as the attacker was wearing “what looked like a very convincing explosive device that later turned out to be a hoax”. The attacker had been wearing the fake explosive vest while carrying out the stabbings inside the building, Mr. Basu said during a news conference.
Eyewitnesses and footage taken on London Bridge show Mr. Khan brandishing knives as he was fended off by members of the public. One held a fire extinguisher which he trained on the attacker, while another poked at him with a stick that was reportedly the tusk of a narwhal that was on display in the hall. Police moved off the members of the public and shot the attacker dead because he appeared to be wearing a suicide vest that turned out to be fake.
Professor Stephen Toope, vice chancellor of the University of Cambridge, said the university was in touch with the Metropolitan Police and awaiting further details of the victims. “I am devastated to learn that today’s hateful attack on London Bridge may have been targeted at staff, students and alumni attending an event organised by the University of Cambridge’s Institute of Criminology,” he said in a statement on Twitter. “We mourn the dead and we hope for a speedy recovery for the injured. Our thoughts are with all their families and friends.”
Local media named one of those killed as Jack Merritt, a 25-year-old graduate whose work brought him to the event. Mr Basu acknowledged that the victim’s name had been published on local and social media but said he couldn’t confirm the identity before a coroner’s identification had taken place.
U.K. police shot dead a suspected terrorist wearing a hoax explosive vest. WSJ’s Alex Frangos reports from near the scene of the stabbing attack that injured several people in central London. Photo: Dominic Lipinski/Associated Press
Mr. Khan’s attendance at the event would have been cleared by authorities monitoring him, officials said.
Mr. Basu said that Mr. Khan’s release in December last year was subject to “an extensive list of conditions.”
“To the best of my knowledge, he was complying with those conditions,” he said.
Police have searched two properties in Staffordshire, where Mr. Khan was living, and Stoke-on-Trent as part of their investigation into the attack.
“We have found no evidence to suggest anyone else was involved,” Mr. Basu said.
As the election campaign resumed, the U.K.’s main opposition party questioned changes in the treatment of imprisoned terrorists and reductions in police numbers during a decadelong program of government spending cuts.
“There’ll be questions asked over the next few days about all that was done,” said Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London and a member of the Labour Party. “We can be more safe with more police and more resources.”
The London Bridge attacker was first sentenced in 2012 to an indefinite prison sentence under a program known as Imprisonment for Public Protection, under which people could be imprisoned for longer than their mandated terms if they were deemed to pose a danger to the public after their release.
In 2013, his indefinite sentence was overturned on appeal with the appeal judges saying Mr. Khan’s plans to set up a terrorist camp didn’t constitute an immediate public threat. A 16-year sentence was imposed, meaning he was eligible for release in December 2018 having served half his sentence, including time on remand, since his arrest in December 2010. Britain’s Criminal Justice Act states that half a sentence needs to be spent in jail with the other half under supervision but in the community.
The Conservative-led government in 2012 ended the IPP program, though that decision didn’t affect those who had already been sentenced under its provisions.
Security Minister Brandon Lewis said the government would look again at that 2012 decision.
“We do have to look again at the sentencing system,” he said. “We will have to move very swiftly.”
Although no new sentences were imposed under IPPs after their abolition, around 2,400 people were still in jail under that legislation at the end of March 2019.
The U.K.’s Ministry of Justice said Mr. Khan was one of 51 inmates with terror links let out of jail in the 12 months to the end of March 2019. Officials say a steady stream of offenders who were sentenced for their roles in a wave of terrorist plots of a decade or more ago are being released into the community now, who, along with fighters returning from Syria, pose headaches for the security services.
The U.K. has suffered a wave of terrorism-related attacks in recent years. In June 2017, London Bridge and the surrounding area were the scene of a bloody rampage by three knife-wielding men, who plowed a van into pedestrians and stabbed people in nearby bars and restaurants. All three were shot dead by police. Eight people were killed and dozens hospitalized in an assault that interrupted campaigning for a national election.
British security services in November lowered their assessment of the risk of a major terrorist attack to “substantial,” the third rung on a five-point scale. That hasn’t so far been changed, reflecting the initial assessment that the attacker was acting alone on Friday.
—Joe Wallace in London contributed to this article
