"It happens here in Britain first," said former extremist and Hizb ut-Tahrir member Ed Husain, addressing Britain's first police counterterrorism conference in Brighton, England, which drew hundreds of police officers and security officials.
"The exposure to that ideology — that radicalism, that extremism, that 'them-and-us' mindset — starts here on our streets," he said criticizing Britain for being too tolerant of radicalism taught in universities and mosques during the 1980s and '90s.
Two ringleaders will be sentenced next month on charges of running the camps and inciting participants to murder. Five other men were each sentenced to prison terms ranging from 3 1/2 years to nearly five years on Tuesday.
The convictions — two of which came Tuesday, one last year and the rest last week following a four-month trial — could be reported for the first time Tuesday after a judge lifted restrictions banning publication of details of the case.
Prosecutors told a court hearing that the men set up camps in idyllic spots across England to train in a range of paramilitary skills.
National parks in the Lake District, in northern England, and the New Forest, in southern England, and quiet corners of the southern counties of Berkshire, Kent and East Sussex were all used for training — including a former school.
"This was not innocent activity taking place on a camping weekend," said Peter Clarke, Britain's most senior counterterrorism detective.
Officials fear the case shows British citizens can now be radicalized, trained and funded to carry out terror attacks — without ever leaving the country.
The British camps, which gave instruction to about 10 men at a time, also offer a glimpse of the training centers British-based radicals hoped to open in Oregon, in the United States, before authorities halted their plans.
"People have got to be alert to the fact that right in the middle of our society these things are going on," said Patrick Mercer, an opposition Conservative lawmaker and ex-intelligence officer.
The development may help explain why Jonathan Evans — head of domestic intelligence agency MI5 — has said Britain faces an ever growing number — currently about 2,000 — of potential terrorists within its borders.
There were 37 terror-related cases prosecuted in Britain last year. This year, there have been 16 cases — five of which elicited guilty please because of overwhelming police evidence, Home Office minister Tony McNulty told the terrorism conference in Brighton.
Secretly filmed video from the camps shows recruits marching with backpacks — used by London's transit network attackers to carry their suicide bombs — and carrying out weapons drills used by insurgents in Iraq and the Taliban.
An undercover police officer, codenamed "Dawood," infiltrated one group and captured cell phone video of the training. One clip shows trainees rehearsing the beheading with a watermelon.
While security officials say the techniques often appear comical — in one video, two recruits fall into a river — they insist the training provides crucial psychological cohesion for would-be radicals.
"What's important is bonding people together, just like traditional team-building exercises carried out by businesses," said a government security official, who demanded anonymity to discuss the inquiry.
A gang of North African men who made a failed attempt to bomb London's transit network on July 21, 2005 — two weeks after the July 7 subway and bus strikes that killed 52 commuters — met and were trained at one of the camps, the official said.
"For the July 7 group, it was whitewater rafting. For the July 21 group, it was meeting at these camps which was the key factor in bringing them together as a cell," the official said.
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/02/26/europe/EU-GEN-Britain-Terror-Training.php