Conservatives branded ''hypocrites'' for heaping praise on Nelson Mandela - the man they branded a terrorist

Unmoved: Lord Norman TebbitGetty

Tory politicians heaping praise on Nelson Mandela were yesterday accused of rank hypocrisy - after supporting a party that spent decades dismissing him as a

View the Original article

The Syrian civil war is breeding a new generation of terrorist

"Hundreds of radicalised young Muslims are reported to have made their way to Syria from other Western nations, such as the US, Canada and France, while intelligence officials have been surprised at the large number of Australian nationals

View the Original article

The runaway terrorist, his burka disguise, and a compensation bid

Left: Mohammed Ahmed Mohamed. Right: the An-Noor Masjid (mosque) and community centre on Church Road in Acton. Photo: PA/WILL WINTERCROSS By Jake Wallis-Simons

8:00AM GMT 10 Nov 2013

In many ways, it reads like an airport thriller.

One dull afternoon in late autumn, a 27-year-old British man of Somali origin, with uneven teeth and chubby cheeks, became the latest terror suspect to disappear, making a mockery of the UK security services, police and judiciary.

After spending several hours in the dilapidated An-Noor Masjid (mosque) and community centre on Church Road in Acton, west London, he sliced off his electronic tag, slipped on a burka and vanished.

The fugitive had been subject to a controversial Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measure (Tpim) notice, which was supposed to restrict his movements.

The date was November 1; the time 3.15pm. That was the moment when Mohammed Ahmed Mohamed stepped out of the ranks of obscurity and became one of the most wanted men in Britain. On Friday, a warrant was issued for his arrest.

Related Articles

MI5 warned of escape six years ago

09 Nov 2013

Police did not seize terror suspect's passport, Home Secretary admits

07 Nov 2013

Boris Johnson calls for tougher terror measures after suspect flees in burka

05 Nov 2013

Burka fleeing terror suspect was on streets despite alleged control breaches

08 Nov 2013

As any thriller writer knows, mounting an escape in a burka is one of the oldest tricks in the book. When the investigating officers watched CCTV footage of Mohamed’s escape, did they recall the case of Yassin Omar, the failed 21/7 bomber who evaded them by wearing a burka belonging to his mother-in-law?

Or that of Mustaf Jama, the Somali asylum seeker who killed PC Sharon Beshenivsky in 2005 before fleeing Britain dressed in a niqab, using his sister’s passport?

Either way, it would appear that the police failed to detect the signs that Mohamed was planning an escape.

On Monday, ITV aired an interview with Sunny Kapoor, a shopkeeper who runs a newsagent behind the mosque. He said Mohamed had purchased five mobile phone sim cards “in the last couple of weeks”.

On Thursday, frustrated police officers, who appeared to be playing catch-up, were seen openly attempting to interview Mr Kapoor as he tried to serve customers at his shop. Other officers are reportedly questioning local taxi companies in case Mohamed pre-booked a minicab to escape.

Moreover, on the very day he escaped, Mohamed was cleared of previously tampering with his security tag.

The police have refused to disclose the specific measures that were in place to monitor him; the resources that are being devoted to the manhunt; or how quickly they responded after his tag was cut, which would have automatically alerted them to his absconding. However, a spokesman was keen to deny the BBC’s story that a “special task force” had been set up to find Mohamed. “The systems are already in place, so it’s very much business as usual,” she told me.

Which isn’t immensely encouraging, as the last terror suspect to abscond while subject to a Tpim notice, an associate of Mohamed called Ibrahim Magag — who evaded police when he removed his tag and hailed a black cab in London on Boxing Day 2012 — remains at large.

But the catalogue of bungles does not end with the police. On Monday, Theresa May, the Home Secretary, told Keith Vaz in the House of Commons that the police had Mohamed’s passport in their possession; three days later, she provoked outrage by asking for the parliamentary record to be corrected to say that “I do not have his passport”. It has since emerged that Mohamed may even possess a second British passport.

If this were indeed an airport thriller, the only missing element would be a misanthropic detective with a whisky habit, who would become obsessed with this slippery case and solve it. But it is real life, and as such is extremely concerning.

On Monday, the Commons reacted with incredulity to the Home Secretary’s assurances that “the police and Security Service

View the Original article