Iraq crisis: David Cameron to meet security advisers

David Cameron said that British Islamists returning home after fighting in Syria and Iraq pose a potentially serious security threat to the UK.

15:06 18 June 2014

As the Iraq crisis worsens, Prime Minister David Cameron is set to meet with security advisers to discuss the gains made by Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) fighters. 

 

Cameron said that British Islamists who are returning home after fighting in Syria and Iraq pose the most serious security threat to the country. 

 

Baroness Neville Jones, a former chair of the Joint Intelligence Committee, agrees with Cameron.  She told Radio 4's Today programme: "As a direct threat to us, Isis has only relatively recently emerged but it has been operating in Syria for quite some time.” 

 

"Unfortunately the UK exports more young men to become jihadis in Europe than any other. The intelligence picture is clear. The numbers are there."

 

She added: "The danger lies in their desire to go, for whatever motive, and what happens to them when they are there. The real danger of radicalisation is them coming back with skills and without any other activity in life."

 

While Cameron has ruled out military intervention, he vowed to do “absolutely everything we can” to protect Britain from the terrorist threat from fighters returning from Iraq and Syria.