- At least 67 people, including six Britons, were killed after a group of militant gunmen launched an attack in Westgate mall in Nairobi on September 21
- David Cameron has no intelligence of plans for an 'imminent' attack in Britain
- But there is a 'worry' that British-based Somalis trained by Al-Shabaab in Kenya will return to the UK with the intention of carrying out a similar attack
|
The Kenyan mall massacre has sparked fears the atrocity was a warm-up for an attack on Britain, with David Cameron calling for 'permanent vigilance' against terrorism in the UK.
The Prime Minister said he has no intelligence of plans for an 'imminent' attack in Britain but acknowledged that there was a 'worry' that British-based Somalis trained by the extremist Al-Shabaab group in the east African country might return to the UK with the intention of committing a similar atrocity.
He said that he had chaired meetings of the Government's Cobra emergency contingency committee over the past week to discuss the implications of the Westgate mall attack.
Concerns: Prime Minister David Cameron today admitted there was a 'worry' that British-based Somalis trained by extremist group Al-Shabaab in Kenya may return to the UK with the intention of carrying out a similar attack to the Kenyan mall massacre
Mall massacre: A soldier carries a child to safety as armed police hunt the gunmen who went on a brutal shooting spree at Westgate shopping centre in Nairobi on September 21
At least 67 people, including six Britons, were killed after a group of militant gunmen launched an attack in the upmarket shopping centre in Nairobi on September 21.
Contingency plans have already been put in place in the period following the similar attacks in Mumbai, India, in 2008, he said.
Mr Cameron told BBC1's Andrew Marr Show: 'We have been looking at this for a long time because of the appalling attack that happened in Mumbai in India.
'I have personally chaired a whole series of meetings years ago, but again actually this week, to check that we have got everything in place to prepare for those sorts of attacks.
'We don't have intelligence that something is about to happen, but it pays to be very, very prepared, very, very cautious, and to work out we have everything in place we can to deal with awful events like this.'
Plans: But Cameron told Andrew Marr on his breakfast show, pictured, that contingency plans for such an attack were put in place following the Mumbai attacks in India in 2008
Asked whether he was concerned that British-based Somalis might export terror from the African state to the UK, Mr Cameron said: 'There is always a worry of that and there is a hotbed of terrorism in Somalia that spills over into other countries, and we are concerned about that and follow that.
'What it shows I think is that we have to keep going against Islamist extremism, whether that is people that are home-grown in our own country or whether it is extremism that is fomenting either on the Horn of Africa or in West Africa or in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
'It goes to this whole argument about why we need well-funded intelligence services, why we need to be engaged in the world, we need to share intelligence with others and why we have to be permanently vigilant.
'I take these responsibilities incredibly seriously, I chair the Cobra meetings myself and I make sure that everything from ambulance to fire to police, that everything is prepared.
'We don't have intelligence about anything imminent, but of course when that Mumbai attack happened and you see what happened in Kenya, any responsible government would look at its own processes and procedures, and say how would we cope with something like that?'
Terrified: Civilians take cover as gunmen roam the mall during the terrorist attack earlier this month
Saved: A woman drops from a ventilator shaft in the mall as plain clothed police rescue her
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario