Manchester bomber was radicalised in the city, rapper claims

A childhood friend of the Manchester bomber has told Sky News that he believes Salman Abedi was radicalised in Manchester and had help in carrying out the attack.

Rapper Geko grew up with Abedi and described him as a "normal", "smiling" teenager, but the two men had not seen each other for the last two years.

In an exclusive interview Geko, whose music videos have been viewed millions of times, said he knew that Abedi had become much more religious but thought that he was a true Muslim following a message of "peace and love".

When he found out Abedi had carried out the attack he said he wept.

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"The reason I cried is because it's someone I know that done it. I was sat there thinking, there's kids who are dead and someone I know did it. That hurts."

The police have now released CCTV images of Abedi's final movements but what exactly caused him to make the journey to a concert strapped with explosives and carry out a terrible act of violence is still not understood.

Abedi was by all accounts a fairly typical teenager.

He was easy-going and liked hanging out with his friends.

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An exchange on social media from December 2012, which has been obtained by Sky News, suggests he was even interested in using cannabis.

The message reads "it's weed time lad".

Geko said: "He was always smiling never had anything bad to say, just chilling."

Raids are still taking place across the city as security services piece together Abedi's final movements before the attack.

Geko believes the man he knew was not acting alone and was radicalised in the city.

"There's a group in Manchester that is brainwashing everyone. And I don't like it because apparently he was in Libya and now he's the one that did the bombing in Manchester.

"It happened out of nowhere, it's wrong and I don't know why he did it.

"I don't know what he was thinking."