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Wednesday, May 24, 2017 5:54am ET by  

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Queen's Brian May on terrorists: ‘They want us to stop making music'

Queen's Brian May has opened up about this week's tragedy at Manchester Arena. 

The world has been left mourning and in shock after a terror attack on Monday night (May 22) during an Ariana Grande concert at Manchester Arena, stole the lives of 22 people and injured 59 others.

Grande, a 23-year-old US pop star, has a young following and her show was mostly packed with kids and teenagers. Her concert had just ended and fans were leaving, when a bomb was suddenly detonated by a suicide bomber. ISIS have since claimed responsibility for the horrific attack.

Brian May has spoken out about the incident and said that he sees the tragedy as an “opportunity” to change British foreign policy. He said:

“I’m afraid I regard everything as an opportunity – out of tragedy comes knowledge and realisation. To me, 9/11 and all these terrible disasters are an opportunity to reevaluate ourselves and I think we failed to do that in 9/11. We went on bombing people. Tony Blair, David Cameron… (Britain) still (has) this attitude that you can solve a violent situation by violence. I don’t believe that. I believe we have to sweep all that away and start again. If we really think we can solve this kind of violent behaviour by being violent ourselves and being racist and reacting in that way then we are in for the most terrible tragedy for the world, because this is how it escalates.

“To me, you have to break the cycle of violence and you have to treat horrific events with compassion. I don’t mean compassion for the person who did the bombing. You have to look at the world and say, ‘What part do we play in the world?’. Of course we have to tight up security. We (Queen) will be playing (Manchester) Arena in December. We’ve played it before and we’ll being playing it in December. No, we won’t cancel because that’s what they want, these (terrorists). They want to ruin our lives, they want to stop us making music, dancing and being happy. Course they do. And we have to stick to what we believe in, which is that life is to be lived.

“Of course you have to look at security but what you have to do much more importantly is look at the underlying causes. Why does the world hate us that much? There are reasons and I believe we must dismantle everything that has gone before and start again.” Speaking to NME yesterday (May 23), the legendary guitarist said:

“I woke up this morning and saw the news of Manchester and the first thing I did was tweet about it, just to express my grief and sympathy with the people. There were mums there that didn’t even know if there child was alive or dead. It’s the most terrible thing. To me, it’s almost impossible to imagine the kind of hatred that has to exist in someone if they would bomb children.” 

May tweeted: “Sending love to Manchester. To all our friends there and all who are grieving for their families. Shocked and sad.” 

An anti-terrorist hotline has been provided for anyone with information about the attack on 0800 789321.

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