Police say car blast outside UK hospital was terrorism

Police on Monday announced that the deadly taxi explosion outside a hospital in England on Sunday is being treated as a terrorist incident.

“Although the motivation for this incident is yet to be understood, given all the circumstances, it has been declared a terrorist incident,” Russ Jackson, the head of Counterterrorism Policing in northwest England, said during a press briefing, according to The Associated Press.

Jackson revealed that a passenger brought an explosive device into a taxi on Sunday, which triggered the explosion that killed one person and injured another, according to the AP. A fire then ignited at the scene.

The passenger died in the incident and the taxi driver was injured.

“Enquiries will now continue to seek to understand how the device was built, the motivation for the incident and to understand if anyone else was involved in it,” Jackson said, according to the AP.

Three men in their 20s were arrested in England under the Terrorism Act in connection to the incident on Sunday. A fourth individual was reportedly detained on Monday.

Authorities believe they are all “associates” of the passenger who entered the taxi with the explosive device, according to the AP.

The blast went off just before 11 a.m. on Sunday, when many individuals in the country were observing Remembrance Sunday and paying tribute to British individuals who died during the war.

Jackson said authorities have not identified a link between the incident and Remembrance Sunday, “but it is a line of inquiry we are pursuing,” according to the AP.

The taxi driver, known locally as David Perry, reportedly drove 10 minutes to pick up the passenger, who asked to be brought to the hospital, Jackson said, according to the news wire. Perry was able to get out of the car, but he was injured in the incident and is currently in the hospital receiving treatment.

Police said authorities examined two locations that were linked to the passenger, which exposed “significant items” at one, according to the AP.