Syria crisis: ‘First UK jihadist’ in suicide attack<\/p>\n\n\n\n
BBC NEWS<\/p>\n\n\n\n
UK officials believe a British man may have carried out a suicide bombing in the Syrian city of Aleppo last week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If confirmed, this would be the first known attack of its type by a Briton in Syria.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The al-Qaeda-linked rebel group in Syria, al-Nusra Front, named the man as Abu Suleiman al-Britani. He is thought to be from Sussex.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hundreds of British nationals are reported to have gone to Syria to fight against government forces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One in 10 foreign militants is believed to be from Europe, while most of the others are thought to have come from Saudi Arabia, Tunisia and Libya.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Officials told the BBC the bomber was “probably British” but the Foreign Office was unable to confirm this without DNA evidence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Britain’s domestic intelligence service MI5 is leading a joint investigation with police into the allegations. The probe is focused on the Crawley area of Sussex.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The al-Nusra Front earlier said Abu Suleiman al-Britani had driven a truck full of explosives at the walls of Aleppo prison on Thursday and detonated it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rebels have launched several attacks on the jail in Aleppo in recent months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Up to 3,000 inmates are thought to be detained at the prison.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rebels have launched several attacks on the jail in recent months. Up to 3,000 inmates are believed to be held inside the prison.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Aleppo, in the country’s north, has been the focus of bitter fighting between President Bashar al-Assad’s forces and rebels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Government helicopters have been dropping barrel bombs – crude weapons comprising cylinders packed with explosives and metal fragments – on rebel-held neighbourhoods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Syria’s conflict has claimed more than 100,000 lives since 2011 and has driven 9.5 million people from their homes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Responding to the report, ODFS Director, Ribal Al-Assad said:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“I am very concerned to hear that a suspected UK jihadist has been involved in a recent suicide attack in Aleppo. I condemn this attack in the strongest terms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As I have said many times since the start of this conflict, it is absolutely imperative that no foreign nationals travel to Syria – they pose an extreme danger both to the people of Syria and their home nations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It is clear from the reports coming out of Syria that Jihadist’s are being trained and brainwashed to commit abhorrent acts capable of mass destruction; imagine the implications for the home nations on their return?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Every nation has a paramount duty to stop it’s citizens from traveling to Syria and those that do should be held to account for their actions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is an extremely serious situation.”<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Syria crisis: ‘First UK jihadist’ in suicide attack BBC NEWS UK officials believe a British man may have carried out a suicide bombing in the Syrian city of Aleppo last week. If confirmed, this would be the first known attack of its type by a Briton in Syria. The al-Qaeda-linked rebel group in Syria, al-Nusra […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2136,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-press-releases"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/odf-syria.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/odf-syria.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/odf-syria.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/odf-syria.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/odf-syria.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6408"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/odf-syria.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6408\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6411,"href":"https:\/\/odf-syria.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6408\/revisions\/6411"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/odf-syria.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2136"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/odf-syria.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/odf-syria.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/odf-syria.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}