A Dnipropetrovsk man was charged in the UK this week with the terrorist-related murder of a Birmingham pensioner of Muslim faith in April and other offenses related to explosions near three mosques in neighboring towns in June and July.
Pavlo Lapshyn, 25, appeared without an interpreter at London’s Old Bailey court on July 25, where he listened to prosecutors read aloud the four charges against him, which include one count of murder, two counts under the UK’s Explosive Substances Act and one under the Terrorism Act, before being remanded in custody. He did not enter a plea.
Little is known at the moment of Lapshyn, and Ukraine’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has been tight-lipped on details.
Foreign Ministry spokesperson Yevhen Perebyinis told the Kyiv Post that attempts by the Ukrainian side to speak with Lapshyn have thus far been unsuccessful.
“The Ukrainian Embassy in London has repeatedly requested a meeting with this citizen. However, (Lapshyn) has twice refused,” Perebyinis said.
Speaking to UK media, Lapshyn’s father, who didn’t give his name, said “my son went for an internship as a programmer and at the same time he needed to work in mechanical engineering in Britain. I am in shock and I hope it is a mistake.”
Lapshyn’s mother, Galina, said he is “a very good son, he has two honors degrees.”
Others who know Lapshyn said news of his arrest came as a surprise. “I would describe him as a modest, quiet, shy boy, a mousy person,” said Lapshyn’s former teacher and research adviser, Viktor Laskin. “Our first reaction was that there might have been some mistake, that (Pavlo) couldn’t have done it.”
However, there are records of Lapshyn experimenting with explosives in Dnipropetrovsk prior to his Birmingham internship. Diana, one of Lapshyn’s former neighbors who didn’t give her last name, recalled an incident that happened three years ago. “The police came… (Lapshyn) used to do (experiments) at home, but one didn’t work, and the door was blown out, and I don’t know how, but no one was injured. (The police) took him away, but he was released later.”
Lapshyn, a post graduate student at Dnipropetrovsk’s National Metallurgical Academy, was detained by West Midlands Police in Birmingham on July 18, along with Ukrainian Denys Nehreba, 22, on suspicion of their involvement in three explosions in Walsall, Tipton and Wolverhampton in June and early July. Nehreba, a Kharkiv university student, was soon released without charge.
No injuries were reported in any of the blasts, according to British police.
A West Midlands Police report said that Lapshyn purchased chemicals and equipment, such as batteries and a clock, to assemble explosive devices. He also modified mobile phones to act as detonators, the report says.
During questioning on July 20, Lapshyn was arrested on suspicion of the murder of 82-year-old Saleem. The grandfather and father of seven was fatally stabbed in April as he walked home alone after worshiping at a mosque in Small Heath.
Saleem’s daughter, Shazia Khan, 45, at a press conference last weekend called her father’s murder “an act of terrorism, because he was killed for his faith and that is exactly what the police have arrested this man for, on terrorism grounds.”
Saleem’s 69-year-old widow Said fought back tears as she talked about what happened to her husband of 50 years was “so wrong.”
Lapshyn was in the UK on a sponsored internship program with technology company Delcam in Birmingham, which started in April. The company also has an office in Ukraine.
UK authorities are working with Ukrainian officials to learn more about Lapshyn’s past. A team of investigators from the West Midlands Counter Terrorism Unit traveled to Ukraine on July 23 to gather more information on Lapshyn, a police statement said.
Kyiv Post editor Christopher J. Miller and intern Anna Shamanska can be reached at [email protected] and [email protected], respectively.
