Police stop Syria-bound teen as plane nears take-off
A teenage girl is stopped from travelling to Syria by counter-terrorism police, who staged a last-minute intervention, removing her from a flight that had begun taxiing down the runway at Heathrow.
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It was feared the 15-year-old was trying to make her way to the war-torn country via Turkey. She is believed to have saved up the money to buy a plane ticket to Istanbul in secret, before being stopped.
The girl, who has not been named, came from the east London borough of Tower Hamlets and, according to reports, a caring family with no extremist connections.
She was understood to be back with her family after the dramatic intervention 11 days ago. However, another 15-year-old girl reportedly managed to evade police and is believed to have travelled to Syria.
‘Big decision’
The Metropolitan Police refused to confirm the reports of the rescue but Channel 4 News understands them to be true. A Scotland Yard spokesman said: “on Saturday 6 December, police received reports of a 15-year-old girl from Tower Hamlets missing from home. Officers were able to locate her and she has since returned home safely.”
The reports first surfaced in the Evening Standard newspaper, which cited a source in east London.
A source told the newspaper: “The plane was taxiing down the runway but we managed to turn it round. This was a big decision to take because of all the disruption it caused. But we had to stop her going. It has probably saved her life.”
‘Significant numbers’
It is not known whether the girl was travelling to join a jihadist group, an increasingly common scenario about which British police have expressed growing concern.
The Met Police Commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan Howe has warned about the numbers of young women the force believed were travelling to Syria.
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“People have been travelling who are 16 or 18. We even had 15-year-olds, and it’s changed because we have seen more young girls or women going out… it was a girl,” he told LBC radio.
“Some have been intercepted, so have been turned back from Turkey, these are the ones we know about. You could go to Spain and then go to Turkey and then Syria. It’s not hard. The numbers are significant, and of course there are still people coming back.”