Children 'brainwashed by ISIS' before returning from Syria pose terror threat to UK, Amber Rudd warns

Home Secretary Amber Rudd issued the warning
REUTERS
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Children returning to Britain from Syria and Iraq who have been brainwashed by Islamic State may pose a terror threat, the Home Secretary has warned.

Amber Rudd highlighted the potential risk from youngsters who had spent “formative years” in the clutches of the extremist group, having been taken to the region by their parents.

Giving evidence to Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) about the threats faced by Britain, Ms Rudd said: “It is absolutely a serious threat.

The families coming back will be potentially having children who are going to be vulnerable, who are going to need protecting - but also potentially fighters themselves who could be a danger to society and could radicalise other people.

“So we are aware of all those different issues… it is something that everybody in Europe is very aware of.”

An Isis militant pictured in Syria
Reuters

MI5 told the committee that since Syria collapsed into civil war in 2011, more than 850 UK-based individuals of “national security concern” were thought to have travelled to the Middle Eastern country, neighbouring Iraq and the region.

It is believed that about half have returned to the UK. More than 300 are thought to remain in Syria and about 100 have been killed.

A further 6,000 fighters from elsewhere in Europe are estimated to have travelled to fight with IS.

Publishing the ISC’s annual report, chairman Dominic Grieve said: “We note that the dispersal of foreign fighters from Syria and Iraq raises serious questions as to when and where they will resurface, and with what intent.

There will also be a serious challenge to reintegrate children who have grown up in the so-called caliphate.”

He said the scale of the terror threat was “unprecedented”, adding: “MI5 have told us it represents a pace which they have not experienced before.”

Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson recently said British jihadis should be barred from Britain and hunted and killed.

He said: “I do not believe that any terrorist, whether they come from this country or any other, should ever be allowed back into this country.

We should do everything we can do to destroy and eliminate that threat.”

But the Government’s independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, Max Hill QC, has said the authorities should look to “reintegrate young and naive” jihadis who travel to warzones, rather than prosecute them, on their return.

Ms Rudd told the committee that as IS has lost territory it has sought to “weaponise” people in Britain and other countries to carry out attacks.

The Security Service chiefs told the ISC: “There is part of [IS] which is functionally best described as an external operations department, which has a whole bunch of people who pretty much all day every day are plotting terrorism in the West in various countries in various ways.” The ISC also warns of the growing cyber threat, including from Russia.

MI5, MI6 and the police have foiled at least nine terror plots this year but five attacks have got through, including at Westminster and London Bridge.

Police were today questioning four men, aged 22 to 41, after raids in South Yorkshire and Derbyshire yesterday to foil a suspected Christmas atrocity.

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