Manchester bomber 'may have used student loan and benefits to finance terror plot'

Police are reportedly probing whether the Manchester suicide bomber used a combination of student loan and state benefit money to fund his devastating terrorist plot.

Salman Abedi, 22, had dropped out of Salford University and is not believed to have been in paid employment when he detonated his home-made bomb at a concert on Monday night, killing 22 and injuring more than 100.

Police are looking into the finances of UK-born Abedi and examining how he was able to finance trips to Libya where he is believed to have received jihadist training in bomb-making.

Abedi dropped out of a business and management degree at the University of Salford at the beginning of his second year before reportedly getting a job in a bakery.

The Telegraph claimed that Abedi received a student loan of £7,000 for the academic year beginning in October 2015, and the same sum again in September 2016, around the time that he dropped out.

Abedi is understood to have been claiming benefits in the run-up to the atrocity, according to the newspaper. As a single person of 22 on jobseekers’ allowance, he would have been eligible to claim up to £57.90 a week.

Born to Libyan parents, his mother Samia is reportedly a nuclear scientist who graduated from Tripoli University at the top of her class and father Ramadan is understood to work as a security officer.

US intelligence sources told American media that Abedi’s family reported their concerns that the young man was becoming radicalised to British authorities.

It is believed his parents fled to the UK to escape the regime of Muammar Gaddafi but returned to live in Libya in 2011 following the overthrow of the dictator.

Police are currently working on the theory that Abedi was not acting alone but was working as part of a wider terrorist cell.

A total of 11 people have now been arrested in connection with Monday night’s atrocity, with nine men currently in custody.

Assistant Commissioner Mark Rowley, the UK’s most senior counter-terrorism officer, said on Friday police had made “immense progress” in penetrating Abedi’s suspected network.

Authorities are currently handling 500 investigations into 3,000 individuals, while it was disclosed on Friday that around 20,000 people were considered former "subjects of interest" by the counter-terror agencies.

Prime Minister Theresa May will chair a meeting of the Government's Cobra emergency committee in Whitehall on Saturday morning to discuss the latest developments in the Manchester investigation with senior ministers, officials and security officers, Downing Street said.

The Press Association contributed to this report.