"A lot of people in the community knew they were going to do it
because in their apartment they had bombs all over the floor ... and
they didn't report them," he said.
U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said Muslims were not helping to prevent attacks such as those that killed at least 30 people in Belgium, drawing a rebuke from Britain's government and from Muslim groups in the country.
In
an interview broadcast on Britain's ITV television on Wednesday, Trump
was asked what his message was for British Muslims after Tuesday's
bombings in Brussels and the attacks in Paris last November.
"When
they see trouble they have to report it, they are not reporting it,
they are absolutely not reporting it and that's a big problem," Trump said.
His comments were countered by British interior minister Theresa May who said he was "just plain wrong" to suggest Muslims in Britain were failing to report suspicious activity by extremists.
Trump,
the front-runner in the race to be the Republican candidate in
November's presidential election, has made a series of controversial
statements during his campaign. His supporters see him as someone who
speaks uncomfortable truths but he has outraged many others in the
United States and around the world.
Trump, who has
called for a ban on Muslims entering the United States, said it was "a
disgrace" that one of the suspects behind last November's attacks in
Paris had been found after a long manhunt by police in an area of
Brussels where he lived.
"He was in his
neighbourhood where he grew up and nobody even turned him in and
supposedly this is retribution for that. It's a disgrace," he said.
Trump
said there were signs that an attack by suspected Muslim extremists in
California in December, which killed 14 people, could have been stopped.
"A
lot of people in the community knew they were going to do it because in
their apartment they had bombs all over the floor ... and they didn't
report them," he said.
"I don't know what
it is. It's like they're protecting each other but they're really doing
very bad damage. They have to open up to society, they have to report
the bad ones."
Britain's May told parliament that Trump was mistaken.
"I
understand he said that Muslims were not coming forward in the United
Kingdom to report matters of concern. This is absolutely not the case -
he is just plain wrong," she said.
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