Remains of the nail bomb that Pavlo Lapshyn planted outside the Kanz-ul-Iman Central Jamia Mosque in Tipton

Pavlo Lapshyn had been in Britain for just five days when he murdered grandfather of 23 Mohammed Saleem by stabbing him in the back as he made his way home after Friday prayers. The 25 year-old white supremacist had moved to Birmingham where he had been awarded a placement to further his engineering studies.

Following his trial counter terrorism officers said that he had acted as a “lone wolf”. But detectives found literature and images related to PoU [the neo-Nazi paramilitary group, Patriot of Ukraine] and fascist Dynamo Kiev supporters on Lapshyn’s Russian Facebook page and on a pen computer drive when they raided the home he shared with a fellow student in Small Heath, Birmingham.

Investigations by counter terrorism officers found that Lapshyn was not a member of any of these groups and that no one else was involved in the murder of Mr Saleem, aged 82, or the bombs that were set off at three Midland mosques.

But Lapshyn was influenced by the ideologies of right wing extremists in Ukraine. Neo-Nazi literature and racist chants popular with Dynamo Kiev fans were among the disturbing set of literature found at his home in Small Heath, Birmingham.

Detectives also found a folder marked “White World” on Lapshyn’s computer which included a violent video game called “Ethnic Cleansing” featuring ‘soldiers’ from the PoU. Another audio file entitled “You Must Murder” contained more racist rants by East European extremists calling for a violent race war.

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