UK plans to seize terror suspects’ passports
Saturday, 30/08/2014
http://paper.hindustantimes.com/epaper/viewer.aspx
LONDON: David Cameron announced plans to introduce new powers to strip terror suspects of their passports to tackle a “greater and deeper threat to our security than we have known before”.
In a hastily convened press conference at Downing Street, the prime minister said he would announce legislation to deal with the security threat posed by homegrown militants.
The measures, set to be announced in the Commons on Monday, would be the first new counter-terrorism powers to be introduced since Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) militants took hold of large swaths of Syria and moved into Iraq.
Cameron said urgent action was needed to address the “poisonous narrative of Islamist extremism” and specifically Isis, a terror group he said was planning to establish a terrorist state on the shores of the Mediterranean.
He was speaking hours after the UK terror threat was raised from substantial to severe for the first time since 2010. This means that an attack is deemed to be “highly likely” – although not necessarily imminent.
In a similar move, the Dutch government also said it wants to strip jihadists who go to fight in Syria or Iraq of their passports, even if they have not been convicted of a crime. The action could however only be taken against Dutch citizens with dual nationality, as “no one should be left stateless”, the government said.
