The Nigerian charged in the US with attempting to blow up a passenger plane had been banned from entering Britain after being placed on a watch list, Home Secretary Alan Johnson said Monday, DPA reported.
Johnson told the BBC that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, had been placed on the list earlier this year after British authorities refused to renew his student visa.
The minister also said he did not believe that Abdulmutallab was acting alone, and that police and security services were examining whether he was radicalized during his studies at University College London between 2005 and 2008.
"If you are on our watch list then you do not come into this country," Johnson said. "You can come through this country if you are in transit to another country but you cannot come into this country."
Johnson also confirmed that British investigations centre on the issue that Abdulmutallab had accomplices and did not act alone.
"We don't know yet whether it was a single-handed plot or (there were) other people behind it - I suspect it's the latter rather than the former," said the Home Secretary.
British investigations were focusing on the issue of whether the Nigerian had been radicalized while in Britain and whether there was "any association with whoever may have been behind this plot," said Johnson.
Investigators have searched a number of properties in central London where Abdulmutallab is believed to have stayed, or with which he had connections.
The Nigerian was charged in the US Sunday with trying to blow up the Northwest Airlines plane with 278 passengers on board as it approached the Detroit, Michigan, airport on Christmas Day.
He was overpowered by passengers and crew on board the plane after boarding the aircraft at Amsterdam's Schiphol airport.
Nigerian terrorism suspect was on British watch list, says minister
