Uncertainty over pandemic and Brexit raise terror risk

Brigadier Ed Butler has warned that the ongoing coronavirus lockdown, coupled with uncertainty over post-Brexit security cooperation, has raised the risk of terror attacks in 2021.

The senior security expert, and former commander of UK forces in Helmand, said that the degree of incidents seen in 2017, including the Manchester bombing and the attacks at London Bridge, Westminster, and Finsbury Park, could be replicated next year.

He said that, while the coronavirus pandemic has reduced crowds and ‘target-rich environments’ for terrorist attacks, there is now the risk that susceptible young people have had prolonged exposure to online extremism, with the potential of violence in the future.

Butler’s assessment comes as the threat level in the UK is raised to ‘Severe’, meaning that attacks are now likely. This follows recent incidents in Vienna and Nice, which he said show that violent Islamists will use whatever weapons are easy to get. In addition to this, security and intelligence agencies are also considering the possibility of an increase in extremist activities from next year as travel restrictions are eased with the rollout of coronavirus vaccinations.

Brigadier Butler said: “I am concerned that 2021 will be very much like 2017 in the UK – what happens in Europe and the near-abroad does end up coming back to this country. We have an excellent counter-terrorist capability, but we also have the backdrop of these constant attacks.

“We have fighters who are returning from abroad. We can’t discount the global threat from international terrorism out there with so many failed states exporting terrorism. We have al-Qaeda, Boko Haram, who are operating and taking advantage of governments being distracted by Covid measures.

“We shouldn’t forget that all terrorist organisations like to reinforce success, and what works last time will work again, and hence the use of knives and the gruesome attacks we’ve seen recently in France and Austria.”

Butler is now chief resilience officer with the Pool Re, a government-underwritten terrorism insurance company.