UK Parliament on Lockdown After Man Brought Down by Armed Police
The United Kingdom Parliament was put on lockdown Friday morning after armed police arrested a man suspected of carrying a knife outside the gates to the Palace of Westminster. London's Metropolitan Police released a statement saying a man "was arrested on suspicion of possession of a knife" near to the Palace of Westminster at 11.10 a.m. local time. "There are no reports of any injuries," the statement added. There were shouts of "knife knife knife" before the man was brought down by a taser, according to a journalist who witnessed the incident. "Our superb police have handled the situation brilliantly," the witness wrote on Twitter. , , The incident took place less than two months after PC Keith Palmer was stabbed to death by terrorist Khalid Masood nearby. Masood ploughed into pedestrians on Westminster Bridge on March 22, killing four people and injuring around 40 before fatally stabbing the officer. He was then shot and killed by armed police. The Westminster Bridge attack was the first of three fatal terrorist incidents in the United Kingdom this year. On May 22, a suicide bomber killed 22 people and injured 119 at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, and then on June 3, eight people were killed and dozens injured after three attacked drove into pedestrians on London Bridge and then carried out a knife attack in neighboring Borough Market.