“MI5 has one hell of a job on its hands.” That was the warning yesterday from the agency’s Director-General, Ken McCallum, in a speech which touched on everything from Russian espionage to Iranian assassination plots, and from the present competition with China to the violent echoes of last century’s conflict in Northern Ireland.
On counterterrorism, McCallum gave the “headline split” of “75% Islamist terrorism, 25% extreme Right-wing.” Despite delving into the shifting ideological configurations of the violence, McCallum underlined that the threat of most concern is still that posed by al-Qaeda and Islamic State.
