MI5 Warning: Al-Qaeda Spreading Operations Into New Countries

In a rare speech on Monday, the head of Britain’s intelligence service MI5, Jonathan Evans, said Al-Qaeda has been spreading its operations into new countries, with British-born extremists now being trained in places like Libya and Egypt.

Evans also warned that the UK was under threat from an “astonishing” number of cyber attacks.

Marco Werman speaks with BBC Security Correspondent Gordon Corera about the MI5 assessment.

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Marco Werman: I’m Marco Werman. This is The World. Despite the continuing violence in Syria and the bloody months of struggle in Libya, the conventional wisdom goes that the Arab Spring has been a good thing – just look at Egypt – a dictator is out and a new leader has just been democratically elected. But today, a counterweight to all the warm feelings about democracy blooming in the Mideast: the head of the British intelligence service, MI5, said that the Arab Spring has provided a fertile moment for al-Qaeda in the Mideast. Gordon Corera is the BBC security correspondent and he’ s on the line with us from London. Gordon, MI5 is historically a pretty secretive organization and Jonathan Evans, its head, hasn’ t spoken publicly since 2010. Why come out now with this surprising statement about al-Qaeda and the Arab Spring?

Gordon Corera: Well, this was an overview, I guess, of the threat that MI5 sees the UK facing in the future. He talked a bit about the Olympics because that’ s the most immediate one but he also moved beyond that and said, “Look, even if we get beyond the Olympics and the security concerns over that, there are these other threats out there.” And he talked about a range of them including, for instance, cyber security and the attacks on the UK in cyberspace but he also did mention this concern about the Arab Spring, particularly saying that in the short term he feels that there are dangers. He talked about the Arab Spring having created a more permissive environment for al-Qaeda to operate, basically the instability in states providing either safe havens or a weakening of the security forces, Yemen being, of course, the classic example of where that’ s happened most.

Werman: Well, Yemen didn’ t have a very successful Arab Spring. Did he give any other specific examples of where al-Qaeda seems to be regrouping in the Arab world?

Corera: Well, he was clear that he thought al-Qaeda was operating to some extent in Syria. He was also talking about the concern that Britons, or people from Britain, were going out to fight in some of these conflicts. For instance, they had done it in Libya, they might be doing now in Syria and that these people might then come back to the UK a bit like they used to in Afghanistan, radicalized and willing to carry out some kind of terrorist act. That was one of his real concerns.

Werman: Right. Given that he spoke specifically about those British citizens traveling abroad for terrorist training, who do you think his statement was intended for? Who was the audience?

Corera: Well, I think it was partly to the broader public, saying, “Don’ t relax now and think that terrorism is over.” “I think there might be some concern,” he said, “that people think, “˜Well, with Osama Bin Laden dead, with things dropping down a bit in Pakistan, Afghanistan, that means we can relax and that there’ s no more threat from terrorism.’ “ I think his point was to say there are still concerns. Of course the job of the head of a security service though is to have concerns.

Werman: As you said, Yemen seems to be the biggest concern for MI5 and you also pointed out that MI5 seems to feel that Afghanistan and Pakistan have receded somewhat, but British troops are still there, there’ s still a war going on in Afghanistan, why did he feel that way?

Corera: Well, it was interesting. He said that the counterterrorist casework that MI5 does, a few years ago, 75% of those cases had some link to Pakistan or Afghanistan. Now that has dropped to below 50% so clearly there’ s been a shift away from there and towards other places like Somalia and Yemen, in terms of seeing links when there are terrorist cases. But he was saying that just because combat troops might be leaving Afghanistan soon, we shouldn’t take our eye off it completely because, of course, there is a danger of a resurgence there in the future.

Werman: I mean, al-Qaeda used to be such a monolithic organization. Did Jonathan Evans give a sense that maybe it’ s been decentralized a bit?

Corera: Yeah, absolutely. I think that’ s the way he was talking about it – less monolithic, more varied in coming out in different places, clearly worries about North Africa, also [inaudible], as well as Somali, Yemen and so on. None of those places necessarily have the concentration of people and, for instance, training camps that might have been there in Pakistan and Afghanistan in the past though so I think that’ s one reason why the UK has been seeing slightly less sophisticated plots and less advanced plots, apart from, perhaps, from some of the specialist bombs coming out of Yemen though.

Werman: All right, Gordon. We’ ll leave it there. Thank you so much.

Corera: Thank you.

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