Harbi Ali charged with murder of UK MP Amess

British police charged a 25-yearold man on Thursday with the murder of MP David Amess and said the killing was an act of terrorism.

Amess, from Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Conservative Party, was knifed repeatedly on Friday in the Belfairs Methodist Church in Leigh-on-Sea, northeast of London, where he had been meeting constituents. Paramedics tried to save him on the floor of the church, but this was in vain.

The killing, five years after another MP was murdered, shocked Britain’s political establishment and has prompted calls for increased safety for members of parliament.

Ali Harbi Ali, a Londoner of Somali heritage, has been charged with murder and preparing acts of terrorism under the 2006 Terrorism Act, police said.

TERRORIST

Ali, the son of a former media adviser to a former prime minister of Somalia, was due to appear at the Westminster Magistrate’s court in London later on Thursday.

“We will submit to the court that this murder has a terrorist connection, namely that it had both religious and ideological motivations,” Nick Price, head of the Crown Prosecution Service special crime and counterterrorism division said.