UK raises threat level after Liverpool taxi explosion

The UK raised its national threat level to severe on Monday, meaning an attack is seen as highly likely, after declaring that a taxi explosion outside a Liverpool hospital on Sunday was a terrorist incident.

Interior Minister Priti Patel said the explosion in the northern England town was the second fatal incident in a month after the knife attack on MP David Amess.

British police said on Monday that the Liverpool explosion killed a passenger who allegedly made the explosive device and carried him into a taxi. They are treating it as a terrorist incident.

“Our investigations indicate that an improvised explosive device was manufactured, and our assumption so far is that it was built by the taxi passenger,” said Northwest Anti-Terrorist Police Assistant Director Russ Jackson.

Police said they believed they knew the identity of the passenger, but could not disclose it.

“Although the motivation for this incident has not yet been understood, given all the circumstances, it has been declared a terrorist incident,” he said.

The explosion set the taxi ablaze outside Liverpool Women’s Hospital just before 11 am on Sunday, when a Remembrance Day ceremony to commemorate those killed in the war was being held at nearby Liverpool Cathedral.

“We can’t at this point make any connection to this, but it’s a line of investigation we’re looking at,” Jackson said.

Three 29-, 26- and 21-year-old men were arrested on Sunday, and Jackson said on Monday that another 20-year-old man was arrested. He added that “significant items” were found at one address, while several other addresses were or would be searched.