Children as young as 13 are being recruited by far-right extremists, who continue to pose a long-term and growing threat, according to UK home intelligence chief MI5.
Although Islamist-linked terrorism remains the predominant threat, MI5 Managing Director Ken McCallum said the threat from right-wing groups had “grown and transformed quite substantially over the past five to ten years.” .
MI5 took primary responsibility for combating far-right terrorism last year.
In his annual security speech at MI5 headquarters in central London, Ken McCallum said the far-right threat was “unfortunately here to stay”.
Ken McCallum said the right-wing threat had “difficult characteristics”
Since taking responsibility for countering the right-wing threat, one in five of the agency’s terrorism investigations has now focused on this group.
The CEO also revealed that more than a third of the 29 attack plots dismantled over the past four years were far-right plots.
Mr McCallum said: “We are gradually finding more and more indicators of potential threat.
“Far-right terrorism is unfortunately here to stay, as a substantial additional risk for MI5 to be managed.”
In a briefing to reporters, he said there were cases of “teenagers posing a potential terrorist risk to their community,” adding: “The case I am currently aware of, of the youngest person who featured in our surveys, was a young individual who was 13 years old. “
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After discussing the case of former neo-Nazi army driver Dean Morrice, who was jailed for 18 years last month after stockpiling chemicals to make explosives, Mr McCallum said the threat of right had “difficult characteristics”.
He detailed some of them which included a “high prevalence of adolescents”, a …
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Source: news.sky.com
This notice was published: 2021-07-14 16:35:00
