MI5 chief says Iran is targeting military sites and suspected plot at RAF Fairford is 'not unique’

Ken McCallum, head of MI5, said in his annual address Tuesday at Thames House, London, that Iran is targeting military sites in Britain and a suspected September plot against U.S.-run RAF Fairford is "not unique." He reported 50 arrests over Iran-linked activities in the last year. He said threats from foreign adversaries have quadrupled and "our terrorism and state threats operational missions are pretty much of equal scale." McCallum called Russia "aggressor number one" and said the Kremlin would be "foolish to cross" into conventional Nato conflict. With almost 1,000 expulsions since the Ukraine invasion, he said the Kremlin's toolkit is weak and Russia is "scrambling to pay criminals to do their bidding," adding "These are not the actions of a great power with the strategic upper hand." He said MI5 has "caught terrorists seeking to exploit AI" including with AI-enabled drones, and bioweapon risks from AI are "not yet realised" but have "potential to change the stakes on existing or even new bioweapons." The UK terrorism threat level rose to severe in April, first time in five years. McCallum cited an investigation of a radicalised extreme right-wing 13-year-old that helped stop an attack abroad. The 2023 National Security Act is in heavy use against China, Iran and Russia.