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White people arrested for terrorism more than other ethnicities

Official figures show that the number of white terror suspects being arrested in the UK has outstripped those of Asian appearance for the second year in a row.

Home Office data reveals that 117 white people were arrested on suspicion of terror offences last year, compared to 111 Asian suspects and 21 black suspects.

Last year, the head of Counter Terrorism Policing declared right-wing extremism as the fastest-growing terror threat in the UK, prompting increased police operations against far-right extremists, such as members of the neo-Nazi terrorist group National Action.

Police have previously reported that a total of 25 attack plots have been foiled since March 2017, 16 of which were Islamist, eight far right and one other. Additionally, there were 280 arrests for terrorism-related activity in 2019, two fewer than the previous year.

Counter Terrorism Policing has warned the public against complacency after the number of people arrested for terrorism offences in the last quarter of 2019 hit a two-year high.

The Home Office’s quarterly release of statistics relating to the police’s use of powers under the Terrorism Act 2000 revealed that there were a total of 280 counter terrorism-related arrests in the year to December 2019, a decrease of one per cent on the previous calendar year.

Deputy Assistant Commissioner Dean Haydon said: “As we have seen in the last few months, attacks can happen anywhere and at any time without warning. The figures show that the gradual decline in terror-related arrests has continued since 2018, but despite this - and the reduction in the threat level from severe to substantial - the attacks in Fishmongers’ Hall and Streatham demonstrate that we cannot allow ourselves to think this threat has diminished.

“With 3,000 or so subjects of interest currently on our radar and more convicted terrorists soon due to be released from prison, we simply cannot watch all of them, all the time.”

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