IS commanders planned attacks in UK in past year, says report
Commanders from the Islamic State (IS) group have been communicating with individuals in a bid to stage terrorist attacks in Britain over the past year, UK investigators reported.
In the past 30 months, 11 IS plots on British soil were identified and disrupted, sources told the Guardian on Saturday.
Authorities in Britain believe there were four plots in 2016 aimed at inflicting mass casualties, all of which were reportedly shut down after arrests were made.
Some of the planned attacks were believed to have been inspired by propaganda put out by the Islamic State group online. But there have been plots with direct involvement from IS military planners in Syria, communicating with militants in the UK, investigators believe.
Counter-terrorism investigators told the Guardian that the intention of communicating with would-be IS militants was to add Britain to the list of Western countries hit by IS-led attacks in the past 12 months.
Extra measures were introduced in the UK after a 19 December truck attack on a Christmas market in Berlin killed 12 people.
More than 850 Britons are believed to have travelled to Syria since IS declared a caliphate in Syria and Iraq in August 2015.
About 15 percent were killed while overseas, mostly while fighting for the group. The rate of Britons going to Syria to join IS has declined significantly in the past few months.
The British government has stepped up its awareness campaigns to encourage young Muslims not to join the proscribed militant group.
Raffaello Pantucci, from the Royal United Services Institute, told the Guardian that IS "is very interested in hitting the UK, but it is harder, so they are going where it is easier. We're likely to see a continuing level of threat we've seen in the last couple of years."
The threat has been mitigated by the fact Britain does not share extensive land borders with Europe and has tight gun laws. But throughout the past year the increasing availability of guns has been a growing concern for British security forces.
The rise of IS and its threats to attack the West led Britain in 2014 to raise its terrorist threat level.
An attack on British soil in 2017 is still deemed highly likely, with the "severe" terrorist threat expected to remain.
"Severe" means the joint terrorism analysis centre believes an attack is highly likely.
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