If Reading suspect was known to MI5 why wasn’t he deported?

Following Khairi Saadallah’s arrest on suspicion of murder following the shocking attacks in Reading on Saturday evening, questions are being asked as to why the Libyan asylum seeker, who was known to security services as a potential terrorist suspect, had not been deported prior to the incident.

That all too familiar phrase, “known to security services”, is necessarily vague, for it covers a range of authorities and the complex circumstances under which an individual can come under surveillance. In 2017, there were as many as 20,000 names on an extremist list, according to counter-terrorism expert Margaret Gilmore.

Such names were not monitored all the time, but “if they did anything out of the ordinary – if they weren’t in their normal location, if they were acting in an odd way and it was brought to somebody’s attention, or they did something criminal – then they would be looked at doubly,” she told the BBC.

It remains unclear whether Saadallah should have reasonably been nearer the top of that list. He had been investigated by security services as a person who might travel abroad to engage in extremist activities, but this inquiry was quickly closed as no threat was identified. He had also been convicted several times and imprisoned at least once, but these were for minor offences not related to terrorism.

“Known to security services” may therefore only be a reference to the former encounter with the authorities – a brief suspicion by security services which came to nothing at the time. Given the sheer number of people they have such encounters with, our intelligence agencies can be forgiven for overlooking this particular individual. It may, in fact, be the more minor encounters that attract the most scrutiny – and not against security services.

As Saadallah was an asylum seeker, being subject to multiple convictions and imprisonment should probably have resulted in his expulsion under the UK Borders Act 2007, which allows for the automatic deportation of “foreign criminals” if they are convicted in the United Kingdom of an offence and sentenced to a period of imprisonment.

Yet, despite being released from HMP Bullingdon 16 days ago, Saadallah avoided this fate, seemingly due to the UK’s policy not to deport foreign nationals to failed states such as Libya. Whatever the merits, this clash in government policy which apparently culminated in Saadallah’s exception from the rule will likely come under scrutiny from the general public.

In his statement responding to the attack, Boris Johnson seemed cognisant of the potential for such scrutiny, choosing to emphasise the need to learn lessons. “If there are lessons that we need to learn about how we handle such cases, how we handle the events leading up to such cases, then we will learn those lessons and we will not hesitate to take action where necessary,” he said.

More tellingly, Johnson added a commitment to take action “if there are changes that need to be made to our legal system”. There also came the rather defensive reminder: “As you know, we’re recruiting 20,000 more [police officers], and of those I think we’ve already got about three and a half thousand in the force.”

The tone of Johnson’s statement was strikingly similar to his response to last year’s London Bridge attack. When it emerged that the attacker was released from prison early despite being convicted of planning to set up a terrorist camp in Pakistan, Johnson insisted: “It’s absolutely clear that we can’t carry on with the failed approaches of the past.” The resultant crack down on the early release of terrorist offenders came soon after.

The Prime Minister had spotted a political weakness and countered it with an immediate change of policy. This time, however, that may be more difficult.

While Priti Patel has made clear her desire to ease the process by which foreign criminals are deported, it is not clear how the government can square a change in deportation policy to failed states with its obligations to the European Convention on Human Rights. Articles 2 and 3 have been successfully used in the past to argue that deportation to a failed state contravenes the prohibition of torture and inhuman or degrading treatment.

It is clear that Johnson wants to be seen to do something, but taking on the ECHR in the middle of a global pandemic may be a step too far. As a politician who enjoys quick, populist fixes to complex issues, he will be looking for suggestions.