Universities are routinely spying on foreign students in Britain in order to help the authorities to keep potential terrorists under surveillance, the Telegraph has learnt. Students’ emails are being intercepted and mobile telephone calls listened to in an attempt to ensure that terrorists do not use universities as cover for their activities. Special Branch and MI5 are running the vetting operation in co-operation with most of the country’s universities.
| Sounds like sensible moves to me. |
The scheme was quietly set up after the September 11 attacks in America, and goes much further than the controversial voluntary vetting system that was introduced in 1994 to prevent the transfer overseas of technology related to weapons of mass destruction. Under that scheme, some universities agreed to contact the Government when assessing applications from potential students from certain rogue states. Since September 11, however, the institutions have been asked to go further and secretly gather and assess information on foreigners studying at their institutions. The universities cannot be named for legal reasons. A close eye is kept on students from the "red flag" countries India, Pakistan, Cuba, Iran, Iraq, Egypt, Syria, Libya, Israel and North Korea. Applicants from those states are vetted, and asked to list their parents, previous study courses and employment. Those causing suspicion are then flagged for further monitoring. Details of students’ telephone numbers, email and home addresses are being passed by universities to the police, MI5 and the Foreign Office, said an official connected to British and American security. The official, who also has links to a leading university, said: "They are helping the security services look at students from the red flag countries. It’s pretty well known that it’s happening. "With all the forms students fill in it is not difficult to get their mobile phone numbers or emails, or find out what kind of activities they are doing or where they hang out." He said that the dramatic escalation in the terrorist threat since September 11 meant that spying on potential terrorists had become a key consideration. "You’ve got this situation now where if you’re from a certain country you will be under suspicion. And the more Madrid-type incidents there are the more this will be stepped up."
Suspected terrorists who have studied in Britain recently include the lecturers Dr Azahari Husin, 45, who went to Reading University, and Shamsul Bahri Hussein, 36, who read applied mechanics at Dundee. They are wanted in connection with the Bali bombings in October 2002, when 202 people, including 26 Britons, died. Ramzi Yousef, the al-Qa’eda plotter behind the 1993 World Trade Centre bombing that killed six people, studied engineering at Swansea.
One senior university official said: "Since September 11, we are co-operating with the security services in a much deeper way than before. We take it very seriously." In many large universities it is official policy to have a senior academic who liaises with the security service and police about students they suspect are carrying out undercover activities. MI5 and MI6 have also used academics to recruit British students. Now, Scotland Yard Special Branch officers monitor e-mails and mobile telephones and universities are expected to pass on suspicious meetings, activities or absences. Several students are believed to have been ordered to leave Britain as a result of such monitoring, after it was discovered that they had links to extremist groups. The policy has predictably angered some critics.
| Let them seethe and be damned... |
Ian Gibson, the Labour chairman of the Commons science and technology committee, said that his committee had heard evidence that foreign students were being spied on. "I think there will be a number of universities that are doing this," he said. "It goes absolutely against the principle of freedom in academia and allowing people to associate with whom they like or think what they like or bomb, gas, or nuke who they like." A Conservative member of the select committee, however, was more pragmatic about the surveillance. Robert Key, the MP for Salisbury, said: "Given the current security situation I wouldn’t be against it as long as the Government was in complete control of the situation."
| Gibson has the Kerry view of the War on Terror. Key realizes we're at war. If I was making the rules, the students would be bounced as soon as there was suspicion. Britain doesn't owe them anything, and if they want to plot and conspire they can do it elsewhere. |
Chris Weavers, a vice-president of the National Union of Students, said: "I think there needs to be very strong justification for any such surveillance. Just assuming that any individual from a certain country might be a risk is utterly unrealistic. However, he admitted: "We’ve seen many people from the United Kingdom who have been involved in terrorists attacks."
| Yes. These waffles are very tasty. |
It would not be legal for the police or security service to intercept directly e-mails or telephone calls without a warrant or permission from the Home Secretary. Both, however, are exempt from the Data Protection Act. |