CIA Spies Recruiting British Pakistani Informers

Via The Standard (Hong Kong) -

The CIA has begun an unprecedented intelligence-gathering operation in Britain to help MI5 monitor 4,000 terrorist suspects.

The US intelligence service is recruiting and handling a record number of informers in the British Pakistani community with the tacit agreement of the British government, according to security sources in Washington and London.

More than four out of 10 CIA operations to prevent attacks on the United States are now conducted against targets in Britain.

This has led to friction between British and American spies, with some US intelligence officers irritated that resources are being diverted to gather intelligence on suspects in their closest ally's backyard.

British intelligence officers do not know the identity of all the CIA informants and are uneasy about some of the uses to which the intelligence has been put.

MI5 as a whole is glad of the help, however, and works closely with its sister service, with American spies sharing information when it directly concerns security in Britain.

Intelligence from CIA informers has helped thwart more than one terrorist atrocity on British soil.

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British security chiefs have long turned a blind eye to the CIA's presence in Britain and, since the September 11 attacks, MI5 and the CIA have worked together closely to combat the threat from Islamist extremists.

MI5 tolerates similar operations by the Israeli agency Mossad, which briefs members of the north London Jewish community on threats to their security.

Jonathan Evans, director general of MI5, estimates that there are around 4,000 people in Britain who pose a direct threat to national security.

Bruce Riedel, a former CIA officer and Middle East intelligence analyst for the White House National Security Council, said many British Muslims travel to Pakistan for terrorist training.
"A great deal of concern about threats to the US homeland is based upon attacks coming out of the UK," he said.

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Read more about this story over @ The Age.com.au.