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The head of Britain’s domestic spy agency MI5 has warned it is being “rolled up” by a growing number of security threats from Russia and Iran, as well as the resurgence of the Islamic State group.
Ken McCallum, the director general of MI5, said in a rare public speech that the security service now “an uncomfortable life‘ decide what we should prioritize and what ‘we just don’t get around to’.
“That puts a lot of pressure on us,” he says. With the new UK government budget due to be unveiled in a few weeks, the head of MI5 insisted that “allocating our finite capacity” is “more difficult than I can remember in my career.”
MI5 investigations into hostile states have increased by 50% in one year, McCallum said, adding that Russian intelligence agents are on a “sustained mission to cause chaos on the British and European streets.” British law enforcement has tackled 20 “potentially deadly” plots backed by Tehran since 2022, and McCallum said the Iranian threat could increase as conflict in the Middle East expands.
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European and British intelligence services have been on high alert for months, warning that the conflict in the Middle East and Russia’s ongoing sabotage campaign across the continent have created a much more dangerous security environment.
Norway raised its terrorism alert level on Tuesday, citing tensions in the Middle East; Austria, Spain, Portugal and Slovenia have also done this in recent months.
The European Union condemned Russia for its “intensifying the campaignof sabotage, election interference and cyber attacks, warning that Russia is trying to divide the European Union and undermine its support for Ukraine.
