Al Qaeda Recruiting 15-Year Old Brits: MI5

The head of Britain's MI5, Jonathan Evans, reports that al Qaeda is recruiting teenagers to carry out terror attacks in that country. It is a pretty stark warning.

“As I speak, terrorists are methodically and intentionally targeting young people and children in this country. They are radicalising, indoctrinating and grooming young, vulnerable people to carry out acts of terrorism,” he said in an address to the Society of Editors in Manchester.

He added: “This year, we have seen individuals as young as 15 and 16 implicated in terrorist-related activity.”

Mr Evans, 49, has taken up where Dame Eliza Manningham-Buller, his predecessor, left off during her time as head of MI5. She, too, warned of the intensive efforts made by al-Qaeda to recruit support for its cause in the UK, and disclosed that her service was aware of and watching 1,600 terrorist suspects.

Mr Evans who has spent much of his career in MI5 in counter-terrorism, revealed that that figure had now jumped to “at least 2,000”.

“We suspect that there are as many again that we don’t yet know of,” he admitted.

An ugly situation.