Slide 1

Terrorism-The Manchester Attacks

Slide 2

Terrorism and its cause

• The FBI defines terrorism has the unlawful use of violence or force against a particular individual and/or property for coercing or intimidating the government and civilian population or any other segment, to achieve social and political objectives (Ronczkowski 2011).
• The practice of terrorism dates back to 1^stcentury A.D.
• Major causes are associated with religious motivations, political or historical wrong and socioeconomic factors, such as, poverty, absence of political freedom and illiteracy (Helling et al. 2017)

Speaker notes- The acts of terrorism are devised in a way to affect a larger audience, with the ultimate objective of showing power and attempting to shake the foundations of the society and the country.

Slide 3

Types of terrorism

• Civil disorder- Collective violence that interferes with security and peace of the community
• Non-political terrorism- Maintains fear for coercive objectives and individual or collective gains (Piazza 2012)
• Political terrorism- Violent criminal behaviour that generates fear for political purpose
• Criminal terrorism- Criminal acts that are calculated and intended for provoking state of terror in public
• Quasi-terrorism- Similar in method and crime to genuine terrorism with a different purpose (Helling et al. 2017)

Speaker notes- The types of terrorism depend on the political system, the country, and history of the region. The word finds it origin in the French Revolution, during the 18^th century.

Slide 4

Situational Crime Prevention

• It refers to the process of introducing discrete environmental and managerial changes for reducing the incentives and opportunities for crime. Therefore, it focuses on the crime settings and not on the criminal acts.
• Strategies include improving surveillance, hardening potential targets, and deflection of potential offenders (Clarke 2009).

Speaker notes- This criminological perspective focuses on expansion of crime-reduction role beyond the justice system. Intervention techniques are formulated to manipulate several situational factors and acts as the primary prevention measure. Thus, it focuses more on reducing crime opportunity rather than criminal potentials.

Slide 5

Case scenario- Manchester bombings

• 22 year old Salman Abedi, a British improvised an explosive device and killed himself along with 22 others at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester Arena on 22^ndMay, 2017 (Gulland 2017)
• 59 people were severely injured and the medical teams worked tirelessly to save the blast victims
• Most victims suffered from open wounds and broken bones
• This was considered as an Islamic terror attack

Speaker notes- The incident was declared as a terrorist attack and case of suicide bombing by the Green Manchester Police. This was the deadliest attack since the bombings of 2005.

Slide 6

The attack

• The terrorist was found to enter the venue and waited till enough individuals had made an exit, before detonating the bomb.
• The attack made thousands of people flee with terror and many got separated in the chaos.
• A scene of carnage was found at the venue and medics had to treat the wounds that are consistent with shrapnel injury (Longhurst 2017)

Speaker notes- Owing to the fact that the attack was made few weeks before the general elections, it clearly had a political purpose and made all parties suspend their campaigns.

Slide 7

Venue for attack

• Selection of the venue was not due to specific rage directed at some random target.
• It was a carefully devised plan influenced by a prolonged terrorist propaganda
• The attack was thought to reflect the consequences faced by chidren at the al Qaeda and ISIS territories (Cronin 2015)

Speaker notes- The bombings were condemned by Theresa May, who further stated that all these attacks were bound together by an evil ideology related to Islamist extremism. It can be defined as any act committed by an individual or groups professing Islamic motivations

Slide 8

Target population

• The concert was selected as the attack target as the fame and status of Ariana Grade went against ISIS values (Helling et al. 2017)
• Targeting the vulnerable section of the society was considered as a barbaric crime by all (Mair and Watkin 2017)
• Despite tight security around crowded places, the attack could not be prevented.

Speaker notes- There were failures in preventing crime through environmental design. Presence of the huge open space increased the susceptibility of the disadvantaged and vulnerable population of getting affected.

Slide 9

Previous attacks

• Previous Islamic attacks occurred at the town of Kuta and at two sites in Jimbaran.
• Absence of appropriate situational crime prevention strategies increases the opportunities for such crimes to occur.
• There is a need to focus on changing the views of people on the ISIS and the religious text of Quran.

Speaker notes- Making changes in the environment will not help in lowering terror rates as the attackers have a greater purpose to fulfill by accomplishing these criminal acts.

Slide 10

Prevention strategies

• Several debates exist on the effectiveness of nature surveillance and environmental designs in preventing terror attacks
• In cases of suicide bombings such as, the concert, environmental modifications will not prove effective (Paraskevas and Arendell 2007)
• Reinforcing the importance of increased security and watch over terrorist groups are the only solution

Speaker notes- Increased security will likely have an effect on lowering the crime trajectories and will provide reassurance to the citizens regarding their security. It will also act as a deterrent for the suicide bombers, thereby reducing rates of such attacks.

Slide 11

References

Clarke, Ronald V. (2009) ‘Situational crime prevention: Theoretical background and current practice’. In Handbook on Crime and Deviance. Springer New York, pp. 259-276.

Cronin, A.K., 2015. ISIS is not a terrorist group: Why counterterrorism won't stop the latest jihadist threat. Foreign Aff., 94, p.87.

Farrell, G., Tilley, N., Tseloni, A. and Mailley, J., 2010. Explaining and sustaining the crime drop in industrialised countries. Crime Prevention and Community Safety: an international journal, 12, pp.24-41.

Gulland, A., 2017. “It wasn’ta medical miracle—we made our own luck”: lessons from London and Manchester terror attacks. Bmj, 358, p.j4309.

Helling, S., Truesdell, J., Nelson, J., Boucher, P., Perry, S., Pelisek, C., Sokmensuer, H., Chiu, M., Green, M., Hanlon, G. and Harris, C. (2017). Terror in Manchester INNOCENCE LOST. People, (25), pp.72-77.

Longhurst, C., 2017. Nurse describes caring for Manchester bomb victims. Nursing Standard, 31(40), p.9.

Mair, D. and Watkin, A. (2017). Children as Targets: The Manchester Arena Attack in the Context of Terrorist Propaganda. A Global Studies Journal, 10(39).

Paraskevas, A. and Arendell, B. (2007). A strategic framework for terrorism prevention and mitigation in tourism destinations. Tourism Management, 28(6), pp.1560-1573.

Piazza, J.A., 2012. Types of minority discrimination and terrorism. Conflict Management and Peace Science, 29(5), pp.521-546.

Ronczkowski, M.R., 2011. Terrorism and organized hate crime: Intelligence gathering, analysis and investigations. CRC press.

Sutton, A., Cherney, A. & White, R. (2014) Crime Prevention: Principles, Perspectives and Practices, Second Edition, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.