UK foils 19 terror attacks in 2 years

May 21, 2019 00:17

The UK government announced a fresh crackdown on its nationals travelling to Islamic State territory in Syria as it revealed that Britain's security forces had foiled 19 major terror attacks in the past two years.

In a speech on national security at Scotland Yard headquarters in London, UK Home Secretary Sajid Javid warned British nationals to leave conflict-ridden territories or risk a jail term of up to 10 years, effectively imposing a ban on travel to Idlib and the northeast of Syria under new powers to tackle suspected terrorists.

"Each and every day, our security services fight against terror from large international terrorist groups, to radicalised individuals. In the past two years, they have foiled 19 major terrorist attacks 14 of them Islamist, and five of them motivated by extreme right-wing ideologies, said Javid, the UK's senior-most Pakistani-origin minister.

And despite this impressive work, the tempo of terrorist activity is increasing, he warned.

Laying out details of the UK's new Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Act, he unveiled powers to designate a region anywhere in the world and make it an offence for British nationals to be there.

He said: I've asked my officials to work closely with CT (Counter-Terrorism) policing and intelligence agencies to urgently review the case for exercising this power in relation to Syria, with a particular focus on Idlib and the North East.

So, anyone who is in these areas without a legitimate reason should be on notice. I can also see that there may be a case in the future for considering designating parts of West Africa.

-- PTI

« Back to LIVE

TOP STORIES

Kejriwal's aide Bibhav Kumar arrested in Swati Maliwal 'assault' case

Bibhav Kumar was produced before Metropolitan Magistrate Gaurav Goyal who sent him to five-day police custody after the police sought his remand to question him about the incident and to retrieve data from his phone.

Back to back terror attacks in J-K: Ex-sarpanch killed, tourist couple shot at

Terrorists struck at two places in Kashmir on Saturday night, killing a former sarpanch in Shopian and injuring a tourist couple from Rajasthan in Anantnag, two days ahead of Lok Sabha elections in Baramulla.

I dedicate my man of the match award to Dayal: Faf du Plessis

Pacer Yash Dayal kept his cool in a tense final over to seal a 27-run win against Chennai Super Kings and send RCB through to the play-offs.

IPL PIX: Spirited RCB knock out CSK; qualify for play-offs!

A spirited performance from their bowlers saw Royal Challengers Bengaluru outclass Chennai Super Kings by 27 runs to qualify for the play-offs.

Banking industry doyen N Vaghul dies at 88

Veteran banker N Vaghul, who led the transformation of ICICI into a private sector lender, died on Saturday afternoon due to health complications. He was 88. Vaghul took over the reins of ICICI, then a public finance institution, in...