Heavily armed police on guard as Carriage Gates reopen after London terror attack

Heavily armed police stood guard as the Palace of Westminster gates re-opened for the first time today.

The Carriage Gates, stormed by fanatic Khalid Masood last Wednesday, were manned this morning by five apparently unarmed officers, who chatted to tourists and passers-by.

Immediately behind stood two armed officers while more armed patrols were in New Palace Yard, where Pc Keith Palmer died, and other parts of the Parliamentary estate.

Outside the gates, a wall of flowers has built up in recent days. Many of the displays pay tribute to Pc Palmer, 48, stabbed trying to stop Masood entering Parliament.

The terrorist, who had mown down 50 people on Westminster Bridge, was shot dead inside New Palace Yard by one of Defence Secretary Sir Michael Fallon’s personal protection team.

One of the tributes at the gates reads: “Dear Keith, RIP, you are a true hero! Our thoughts are with your family & friends.”

Foreign Office minister Tobias Ellwood, who tried desperately to save Pc Palmer’s life, was among the thousands of people who read messages left with hundreds of bouquets of flowers on Parliament Square.

One of them, from the Prime Minister, read: “With deepest condolences for those who lost their lives as a result of this evil and cowardly attack. Our thoughts and prayers are with them and their families.”a

The family of Pc Palmer visited the spot where he died on Saturday.

Today MPs and peers stepped up demands for security to be bolstered at Westminster amid reports that a table-top “war game” of a full-blown terrorist attack on Parliament, with four assailants with automatic weapons, could have left many MPs and other people on the premises dead.

Former Met Police commander Lord Paddick tweeted: “We need to protect unarmed officers at perimeter.”

Shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry suggested barriers should be put up to seal off part of the estate if a terror strike took place and that messages on how to respond could be broadcast by Tannoy.

She told BBC radio’s The Westminster Hour: “There was confusion. And the truth is there are a lot of people who aren’t MPs and they don’t have access to emails, and the visitors, and everybody else, they didn’t know what was going on and they didn’t have that form of communication.

"We have to think about a communication system that works for everybody.”

A row continued to rage today over the encrypted messaging service WhatsApp, for potentially allowing terrorists to communicate undetected.

Masood is understood to have used the app moments before embarking on his 82-second killing spree, in which he mowed down tourists and workers on Westminster Bridge in a rented 4x4.

Home Secretary Amber Rudd called for encrypted networks to build back doors into their systems so security services can access terrorists’ messages during investigations.

Two men today remained in custody over the Westminster attack. Masood’s most recent partner, Rohey Hydara, and a 32-year-old woman have been released after their arrest last week.

Counter-terror detectives believe the killer acted alone on the day but are still trying to establish if he had help in planning the attack.

In other developments:

• MI5 is thought to have investigated Masood’s links with four al Qaeda-inspired terrorists who admitted plotting a bomb attack on a Territorial Army base in Luton.

• Masood may have been influenced by the teachings of jailed Islamic State supporter Anjem Choudary while he was living in Luton.

• More details were revealed about the killer’s family.

Last week Theresa May confirmed that Masood had been investigated by the security services several years ago for links to “violent extremism”.

He was dismissed as a peripheral figure. It is thought the fitness fanatic may have come into contact with a gang of four extremists from Luton who were later jailed in 2013 for plotting attacks in the UK.

Masood, then called Adrian Ajao, lived less than a mile from one of the conspirators in 2010 and may have attended the same gym as the gang.

The fanatic taught English at the time and one colleague told The Times he once asked about the group Al-Muhajiroun, a banned extremist group run by Choudary, who was jailed last year for supporting IS.

Further details emerged today of the different paths followed by Masood’s two daughters.

While his youngest Teegan Harvey, now 18, refused to convert to Islam and had a private education before attending sixth form at Tunbridge Wells’ Girls Grammar School, the eldest, Andi, 24, converted to Islam six years ago.

She is said to have followed her father to Birmingham, where he lived recently. Neighbours say she wears Islamic dress and covers her face in public.

Teegan still lives with her mother Jane Harvey, 48, a successful businesswoman, at their home in Tunbridge Wells. She first met Masood in the early Nineties, when he was known as Adrian Elms, and they settled in Northiam, near Rye in East Sussex. While there Masood was jailed after slashing a man’s face with a knife and after his release from prison left his wife and two children to live in Eastbourne.

Yesterday a 30-year-old man was arrested in Birmingham on suspicion of preparation of terrorist acts, making him the 12th person to be held over the attack.

Another man, 58, also arrested in Birmingham, remains in custody.

Officers have carried out 15 searches at various addresses in east London, south London, Brighton, Surrey, Carmarthenshire, Birmingham and Manchester.

Masood’s victims included US tourist Kurt Cochran, who died, and his wife Melissa, who was badly hurt. Aysha Frade, believed to be a 43-year-old married mother of two, also died, along with retired window cleaner Leslie Rhodes. Dozens of other people were injured.