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UK terror prisoners expected to rise tenfold in next decade

IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency

London, Nov 8, IRNA
UK-Terrorist Prisoners
The number of terrorist prisoners held in jails in England and Wales is expected to increase tenfold from 131 to more than 1,600 over the next 10 years, according to forecasts made by the Ministry of Justice.

The release of figures to the Home Affairs Select Committee also shows that of the current prisoners, only 48 have so far been convicted, while 59 remain remained in custody and 10 are pending extradition.

It was further revealed that 50 terrorist prisoners have declared themselves foreign nationals, with Algerians and Jordanians the largest groupings, according to the Guardian newspaper Thursday.

The estimate on the huge rise in terrorist prisoners was presented to the all-party committee, including the projection that 1,300 of them will need to be dealt with as high-security category A prisoners.

But Phil Wheatley, the director general of the Prison Service, warned against a strategy of concentrating convicted terrorists, arguing that the experience in Northern Ireland had shown that it led to their forming tight cells in which they could plot further acts in and out of prison and radicalize others.

"If we have a very large increase that takes us beyond our current category A capacity then we would have to build more high-security prisons or convert existing prisons, giving them extra security," Wheatley said.

He told the parliamentary committee that the balance in the argument lay with dispersing convicted terrorist prisoners throughout the high-security prison estate, with renewed efforts to monitor their activities and counter any attempts to radicalize others.

Despite the threat from al-Qaida-inspired extremism, prison Service chiefs were said to have also warned that they also had to cope with Northern Ireland groups, members of anarchist and anti-globalization groups, animal liberation activists, and members of the far right.

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