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Evening Standard comment: London’s solidarity with Manchester today

Who can understand the perverted mind that seeks to kill and maim as many teenage children as possible with a suicide bomb? No misguided cause or alleged grievance could ever justify the horror that was visited on the parents and children leaving a pop concert in Manchester last night. Britain today is numbed by the pain of so many young lives lost. Every parent who has ever waved off an excited child for a night out with friends with a warning to be careful, or waited at a train station or in a car to pick them up after a show, will be thinking of those desperate parents in Manchester today. We can only imagine the agony of the victims’ families, the anguish of parents searching for their children, the life-changing trauma of those who were there and saw the slaughter.

This is the worst terrorist atrocity to be committed on the British mainland since the loss suffered here in London on 7/7. There will be time to reflect on lessons to learn, and how we can do even more to keep us safe from those who seek to commit such crimes against us. We must look again at our intelligence gathering, at the security of our public spaces, of the fight we must take to those at home who wish such harm upon us and those who inspire them abroad. We should confront forcibly anyone who seeks to exploit this awful event as an excuse to divide our country, or set one community against another. As Matthew D’Ancona writes here, the teenagers and parents who went to see Ariana Grande last night represent our country as it is in all its wonderful diversity, freedom and enthusiasm. But all this is for later.

Today we commend the rapid response of the Manchester police and other emergency services, who arrived so quickly and had to deal with such a desperate scene. We salute the hospital staff who worked through the night, and will work through today trying to save lives. These public servants come from all our communities, and remind us of what unites us as a nation.

Terrible loss

For Manchester, as for London, coping with the aftermath of terrorism has become part of what defines and strengthens the city. The IRA truck bomb in the city centre in 1996 was supposed to destroy Manchester. Instead it acted as a catalyst for its rebirth as the exciting, bustling modern metropolis it is today. It was good to hear the new Mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, speaking this morning of how the city will be open today, with people going about their work and attending school. Sadiq Khan speaks for all Londoners when he says we stand united with our Mancunian fellow citizens. The powerful words of Home Secretary Amber Rudd reassure us that the authorities are providing all possible support, and that an intense investigation is under way by police and intelligence agencies to identify the killer and any support he may have had.

We say on these occasions that we will not be cowed, and that we will carry on so the terrorists never win. And, of course, that is right. The suspended general election campaign will restart. The great city of Manchester will continue to thrive. There will be more pop concerts. The world mourns and moves on. But the moving words opposite from Colin Parry, father of 12-year-old Tim — the young boy who was killed not far from Manchester in the IRA Warrington bomb 24 years ago — should remind us that for the parents who have lost children, for the children who have lost parents, for the siblings who have lost sisters, for those who survived and who will carry physical and mental injuries for the rest of their lives, there can be no “moving on”. The terrible night of May 22 2017 will stay with them forever. We resolve to stand with these grieving families — and we remember those killed not just as victims but as wonderful people who live on in the memories of those who loved them dearly.