London attack is attack on world: Johnson

Terming the London attack as "cowardly" and despicable, UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said perpetrators of such attacks have a "bankrupt and odious" ideology that seeks to twist and pervert the Muslim religion.
"There is a bankrupt, odious ideology that seeks to twist and to pervert the Muslim religion and that they need to be treated as criminals. We need to see the very clear link between extremism of any kind and the propensity to commit terrorist acts. That is the approach we follow in the UK," Johnson told reporters here today.
Before addressing reporters, Johnson had opened a meeting on Somalia at the UN Security Council.

The 15-nation Council observed a minute of silence in honour of the victims of the terror attack in London in which four persons, including the attacker, were killed.
Authorities said 52-year old British-born Khalid Masood carried out the attack for which ISIS has claimed responsibility.
Johnson said the world is united to defeat the people who launched this attack and to defeat their "bankrupt and odious ideology. "

"Victims in the London (attack) were from 11 nations which goes to show that an attack on London is an attack on the world," he said.
He was asked about the Trump administration's approach to terrorism and banning people from mainly Muslim countries and whether this will be a policy that Britain will have to enforce.

"We both exercise our own protections in so far as people coming into our countries is concerned. It is quite right that the UK should have its own system and the US is introducing its own. We will cooperate and share information in order to foil whatever they may be preparing," he said, adding that terrorism is a global threat and nations have to tackle it by sharing information and intelligence.
"The cooperation between the UK government and the US administration is intense and will continue," he said.
He stressed that countries are coming together, including from the Muslim world, to defeat ISIS in its heartland in Syria and Iraq and "I think that will have a big effect".

"The people will see that the charisma of the ghastly pull that the group had seemed to exercise in the last few years on people from around the world is diminishing and fewer are travelling to that place to take up arms. We are exploding the ludicrous pretensions of this so called Calipahate and I believe we are turning the tide," he said.
"There is a tide of hate washing around the world and we together globally can turn that tide," not just on the battlefields but in the hearts and minds of those who are subscribing to these ideals, he said.

He also told reporters that internet providers and social media companies have "got to look at the stuff that's going up on their sites, they've got to take steps to invigilate it, to take it down where they can.