Britain faces a new security threat as a result of the global economic crisis, the head of MI5 has warned, in the first ever interview by a director general of the Security Service.
Jonathan Evans said the international recession could be a "watershed moment" which will shift the balance of power away from the West.
Despite MI5 achieving notable success against al-Qaeda in Britain, Mr Evans warned that with the decline in economic power of the UK, US and Europe, new threats to national security are likely to emerge.
"Where there have been watershed moments, there have often been national security implications from that, a new alignment," he said. "We have to maintain flexibility and respond to threats. The world will not stay the same."
Well, duh!?
In his last public remarks - in November 2007 - Mr Evans warned that al-Qaeda was recruiting British Muslims as young as 15. At the time around 2,000 suspected extremists were under surveillance.
But since then, he said MI5 had succeeded in targeting homegrown fundamentalism, securing 86 successful prosecutions in the last two years.
Mr Evans described developments as "very encouraging" but warned "the networks have not gone away."
"There could easily be activities that we are not aware of," he added. "We don't have anything approaching comprehensive coverage."
Mr Evans said there were many individuals in Britain who supported al-Qaeda or considered themselves members of the group and were helping channel fighters, equipment and money abroad.
But he said there was less "late stage attack planning," particularly in the last 18 months,.
"It has had a chilling effect on the enthusiasm of the networks and they have been keeping their heads down," he said although there was "enough intelligence to show an intent to mount an attack" and it "could happen at any stage."
Oh for fuck's sake!
So what you're saying is: "we're doing a good job and earning our keep, but you must be eternally vigilant and sacrifice more liberties and keep shovelling money at us because we say so."
I can't help but feel that he's over-egging the pudding to make sure his budget gets approved.
Cunt.
1 comment:
MI5 aka Box 500 was well known within the ranks of Special Branch, now sadly defunct, as a bunch of Chinless Julians who were always popping off for long weekends in the country and trying to pass the buck before so doing.
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