A recording of Mohammed Emwazi has emerged in which the Islamic State killer denied he was an extremist and claimed to have been threatened by British security services.
The knife-wielding murderer known as "Jihadi John" purportedly said MI5 spies told him they were keeping close tabs on him during an interview with controversial advocacy group Cage.
The BBC said the recording was taken after Emwazi was deported from Tanzania and questioned by security operatives in 2009.
Cage's research director Asim Qureshi - who last week described the now-radical Islamist as a “kind, gentle, beautiful young man” said he taped the recording on a dictaphone. In it, Emwazi recalls being quizzed at Amsterdam's Schipol airport.
He claimed agents had tried to "put words in my mouth", before they allegedly added: "'We are going to keep a close eye on you, Mohammed. We already have been and we are going to keep a close eye on you'".
Emwazi is also apparently heard recounting how he allegedly told an MI5 officer that the 9/11 terror attacks and 2005 London bombings were extremist acts in which "innocent people died" before adding: "What happened was wrong".
He also claimed a British agent accused him of trying to reach Somalia for terrorism training when he had tried to head to Tanzania.
He said: "He (the officer) looked at me and he said 'I still believe that you're going to Somalia to train'.
"I said 'After what I just told you, after ... I told you that what's happening is extremism ... you're still suggesting that I'm an extremist?"'
Emwazi is believed to have travelled to Syria to join Islamic State militants in 2012 - three years after the interview is thought to have been recorded.
Asim Qureshi, who made the recording, last week described Emwazi as an "extremely kind" and "extremely gentle" man who had been radicalised as a result of harassment by security agencies.
The Cage research director said he believed the approach taken by the agents was "a factor in the reason why he felt like he didn't belong in the UK any more".
