According to the UK government’s latest counterterrorism report, CONTEST, published on April 9, Syria is now the biggest threat to the United Kingdom.
In presenting the report, Home Secretary Theresa May said, “The principal threat to the UK continues to be from militant Islamist terrorists and many of the threats we face continue to have significant overseas connections, highlighting the importance of our work with international partners. The most significant development in connection with terrorism during 2013 has been the growing threat from terrorist groups in Syria. Several factions of Al Qaeda are active in Syria, supported by rapidly increasing numbers of foreign fighters, including numbers in the low hundreds from this country and thousands from elsewhere.”
There are fears that British visitors who have been radicalized in Syria are being encouraged to return to the UK to carry out attacks there rather than staying to fight. UK police and security services are monitoring around half of returnees, and some arrests have already been made.
The CONTEST report warned that dealing with terrorism in Syria is a very significant challenge due to the numbers of people fighting with the many Syria-based terrorist groups, their proximity to the UK, ease of travel across porous borders and the ready availability of weapons.
2013 saw two terrorism-related murders in the UK, the first in the country since 2005. There were also attempted terrorist attacks against mosques and 13 British nationals were killed in terrorist attacks by Al Qaeda linked groups overseas, the highest number since 2005. In the 12 months up to September 2013, there were 257 terrorism-related arrests in Great Britain; 48 people were charged with terrorism offences and 73 with other offenses.
The Home Secretary said that significant resources and capabilities have been put in place to deal with the threats. “We have a sustained cross-government effort to deal with the new and wider range of terrorist threats we now face overseas,” May said. “We have increased the pace and range of our Prevent work. We are making our border and our aviation sector even more secure. And we are reshaping our emergency response to deal with new terrorist methods and techniques.”
The CONTEST findings may also require a change in tactic from Cameron’s government, which had previously decided to step back from involvement in the Syrian conflict.
http://www.hstoday.us/
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