Category Archives: UK security and counter-terrorism

Met police urged to prosecute Iranian accused of backing Rushdie fatwa

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Officers are reviewing a dossier accusing Sayed Ataollah Mohajerani, who lives in London, of encouraging terrorism

The Metropolitan police is being urged to crack down on Iranian terrorism in the UK by prosecuting a former senior Iranian government official accused of advocating the fatwa against Sir Salman Rushdie.

The Metropolitan police has been studying a legal dossier accusing Sayed Ataollah Mohajerani, who lives in Britain, of encouraging terrorism contrary to the 2006 Terror Act. He denies the claims.

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MI5 refused to investigate ‘Russian spy’s’ links to Tories, says whistleblower

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Party member lodges a complaint about the security services ignoring attempt of Russian infiltration into the Conservatives

MI5 repeatedly refused to investigate evidence that an alleged Russian spy was attempting to cultivate influence with senior Conservative politicians and channel illegal Russian funds into the party, a Tory member has alleged in a new complaint lodged with the investigatory powers tribunal (IPT).

Sergei Cristo, a Conservative party activist and a former journalist with the BBC World Service, has lodged a complaint with the investigatory powers tribunal, filing the case after corresponding with the chair of parliament’s intelligence and security committee, Conservative MP Julian Lewis, who recommended he take the information to the authorities.

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Ministers studying plans for UK child-specific terrorism orders

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Exclusive: Official adviser recommends giving those arrested for low-level crimes a choice to accept help or face jail

New legal terrorism orders specifically for children should be brought in to tackle the growing numbers being arrested, the official adviser on terrorism law has told the government.

Ministers are studying plans that would result in children being compelled to accept help or face jail, devised by Jonathan Hall KC, the independent reviewer of terrorism legislation.

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Abduction of Lockerbie bomb suspect undermines rule of law, analysts say

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Mohammed Abouagela Masud, who has appeared in US court, was seized by notorious Libyan militia from Tripoli home

The abduction of a former Libyan intelligence operative accused of preparing the bomb that brought down Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988 and his transfer into US custody was agreed about three months ago after conversations between US government and Libyan officials, the Guardian has been told.

Mohammed Abouagela Masud appeared briefly in court in Washington DC on Monday, accused of having set the timer for the bomb that destroyed the Boeing 747, killing 270 people in the most deadly terrorist attack to have taken place on British soil.

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Third Lockerbie bomb suspect now in US custody, officials say

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Mohammed Abouagela Masud accused of setting timer for bomb that destroyed Boeing 747, killing 270 people

A Libyan accused of preparing the bomb that killed 270 people when an explosion ripped through Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988 is now in US custody, officials have confirmed.

Scottish prosecutors, who have been closely involved in the investigation, said the families of those who were killed “have been told” that Mohammed Abouagela Masud had been extradited to the United States.

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‘Desensitised’ ex-IS followers remain threats, Shamima Begum hearing told

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Home Office argues people trafficked to Syria were exposed to extreme violence which poses ‘almighty problem’

People trafficked to Syria and radicalised remain threats to national security as they may be desensitised after exposure to extreme violence, the Home Office has argued, in contesting Shamima Begum’s appeal against the removal of her British citizenship.

Begum was 15 when she travelled from her home in Bethnal Green, east London, through Turkey and into territory controlled by Islamic State (IS). After she was found, nine months pregnant in a Syrian refugee camp in February 2019, the then home secretary, Sajid Javid, revoked her British citizenship on national security grounds.

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Armed police guard Iranian TV studios in London after Tehran threats

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Persian language channel said threats to journalists had escalated in response to coverage of protests

Armed vehicles have been deployed outside the Iran International television studios in London after two of its journalists were threatened by Tehran, the channel said.

There were about seven vehicles outside the studio in Chiswick Park, west London, after “severe and credible” threats were recently made against two of the UK-based channel’s journalists, one of its spokesmen told AFP.

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Neurodiverse women sought for jobs at GCHQ and BAE Systems

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Organisations want to recruit more women with autism, dyslexia and ADHD to work in cybersecurity roles

The British spy agency GCHQ and weapons manufacturer BAE Systems have issued an appeal to attract more neurodiverse women to work for them in cybersecurity jobs.

The employers are actively seeking women with autism spectrum disorder, dyslexia, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) for cybersecurity roles to address gaps in their workforces.

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Burnham: poor leadership left Manchester emergency crews unready for attack

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Greater Manchester mayor says report into 2017 atrocity raises serious questions for whole of UK

The “poor leadership” of emergency services meant Manchester was not ready for the terrorist attack that killed 22 people in 2017, the region’s mayor, Andy Burnham, has said.

A damning inquiry report on the Manchester arena bombing identified significant failings by police, fire and ambulance services. At least one of those killed would probably have survived were it not for a response that was described as badly prepared, delayed and chaotic, it was found.

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James Cleverly calls for countries to unite to deprive terrorists of funds

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UK foreign secretary was speaking at memorial ceremony for victims of 2008 attacks in Mumbai

Countries must work together to deprive terrorists of funding in order to prevent deadly attacks, the UK foreign secretary, James Cleverly, has said.

Cleverly is in India for a two-day meeting of the UN security council’s counter-terrorism committee, which is being held in Mumbai and Delhi.

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No signs Russia is preparing to use nuclear weapon, says GCHQ boss

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UK spy chief says Kremlin does not appear to be engaged in preliminary steps despite Putin’s threats

The head of GCHQ has said the UK spy agency has not seen any indicators that Russia is preparing to use a tactical nuclear weapon in or around Ukraine despite recent bellicose statements from Vladimir Putin.

Jeremy Fleming, speaking on Tuesday morning, said it was one of GCHQ’s tasks to monitor whether the Kremlin was taking any of the preliminary steps needed before a tactical weapon was being made ready.

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Profumo spy had weakness for women and drink, archives reveal

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Files on Russian intelligence officer and ‘lady-killer’ Eugene Ivanov littered with reports of drunkenness

Eugene Ivanov, the Russian spy at the centre of the 1963 Profumo scandal, was a philandering alcoholic whose weakness for women and drink M15 hoped to exploit to get him to defect, but who ended up toppling the Macmillan government by chance, according to newly released intelligence files.

He arrived at the Russian embassy in London as assistant naval attache in 1960 but M15 suspected he was an intelligence officer, partly because he didn’t seem to know much about ships and also he carried an umbrella.

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GCHQ head: Putin making strategic errors due to unconstrained power

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British spy agency director to say in rare public address that Ukraine is ‘turning the tide’ against Russia

Vladimir Putin has made strategic errors in his pursuit of the war in Ukraine partly because there are so few restraints on his leadership, the head of the British spy agency GCHQ will say in a speech on Tuesday.

Russia’s soldiers are running out of supplies and munitions and initial gains made by Moscow are being reversed, Jeremy Fleming is expected to add in a rare public address.

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Truss axes national security council, sparking ‘talking-shop’ concerns

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Labour says new merged foreign policy council could reduce Whitehall policy-makers’ focus on security

Liz Truss has scrapped the national security council and merged it with two Boris Johnson-era foreign policy committees in a structure that Labour warned risked diluting the government’s security focus.

Created in 2010 under the coalition, led by David Cameron and Nick Clegg, to better coordinate security policy after the disaster of the Iraq war, the NSC is now to be replaced by a broad eight-strong foreign policy and security council (FPSC).

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Should Shamima Begum be allowed to return to the UK to argue her case?

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A new book says Met police knew she was helped to join IS by a Canadian spy, reinforcing concerns she was victim of trafficking

It is not new – although it is eyecatching – to report that Shamima Begum, then 15, was helped to travel to Syria and join Islamic State by a Canadian agent. Mohammed al-Rashed was picked up by the Turkish authorities in March 2015, and said at the time he was an informant for Canadian intelligence, and had helped Begum travel from Istanbul airport to the Syrian border a few days earlier.

What is new is the suggestion that the Metropolitan police knew about Canada’s behind-the-scenes involvement for some time. A book, The Secret History of the Five Eyes, out this week, reveals that Canadian intelligence officers went shortly after to the British police to admit their connection to Rashed, boosting the argument that the teenager from Bethnal Green and her two friends were in fact trafficked.

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British Sikh activist ‘tortured in India after tip-off from UK intelligence’

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Lawyers for Jagtar Singh Johal say he was given electric shocks after unlawful arrest in Punjab in 2017

A British Sikh campaigner is facing a possible death sentence after the UK intelligence services passed on information about him to the Indian authorities, according to a high court complaint.

Lawyers for Jagtar Singh Johal from Dumbarton, Scotland, say he was tortured, including being given electric shocks, after his unlawful arrest in the Punjab in 2017 where he had travelled for his wedding.

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Half of Russian spies in Europe expelled since Ukraine invasion, says MI6 chief

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Richard Moore says 400 intelligence officers operating under diplomatic cover have been expelled

Half of all the Russian spies operating under diplomatic cover around Europe have been expelled since the start of the war in Ukraine, the chief of MI6 has told a US security conference.

Richard Moore, who heads British foreign intelligence, said the expulsions of about 400 Russian diplomats from countries in continental Europe, including France and Germany, had dramatically reduced the Kremlin’s espionage capabilities.

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UK warned it is failing to adapt as terror threat shifts from groups to lone attackers

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Five years after London Bridge and Borough Market attacks, watchdog says psychologists should feature in counter-terrorism

Psychologists and behavioural scientists should be deployed more frequently to counter-terrorism operations as the number of neurodivergent individuals under investigation rises, a watchdog has advised.

The government’s independent reviewer of terrorism legislation told the Observer that evaluating the threat from individuals with conditions like autism was becoming an increasingly prevalent challenge. Jonathan Hall QC said: “You are seeing a lot more neurodivergence and mental health coming into terrorist investigations, and that’s also having an impact on deradicalisation programmes.

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UK Prevent scheme should be ‘ideologically blind’, says adviser

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Amid leaks of strategy’s review, Sara Khan says focus on only one form of extremism is counterproductive

The counter-terrorism Prevent programme, which has been dogged by claims of being a cover to spy on Muslim communities, should be “ideologically blind”, a government adviser has said.

The strategy is currently the subject of a review by Sir William Shawcross, and leaks suggest it will conclude that Prevent has been too focused on rightwing extremism in recent years. Instead it will say there should be a renewed focus on Islamist extremism, the leaks show, prompting accusations that the findings are politically motivated.

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Woman terrorised by MI5 agent takes legal action against service

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Man with background in rightwing extremism accused of attacking woman with machete and threatening to kill her

A woman who was terrorised by an MI5 agent with a background in rightwing extremism is taking legal action against the security service.

Beth, not her real name, claimed the man, her former partner, attacked her with a machete and threatened to kill her.

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