SHADOW Foreign Secretary Dame Priti Patel has said that Iran is a threat in the UK and described the US strike on its nuclear facilities as “absolutely necessary”.
Speaking on the Camilla Tominey Show on GB News, she said: “America’s actions were absolutely necessary. We should be under no illusions whatsoever about the threat of Iran to us all.
“Yes, to Israel, Iran’s stated objective is to obliterate the only Jewish state in the world. It’s a country that yells out ‘death to America’, and has done so for many, many years.
“Also, as we saw not just yesterday, but Friday, even eight weeks ago, we see Iranian proxies operating in our own country. They’re a threat to our own national security.
“I actually do feel very strongly about this. And having been a former Home Secretary and seen too many files on Iran and seeing the implications for our country, it is right that the agencies look at everyone that are involved in these, not just protests, but those that are carrying the Iranian placards, the propaganda, basically defending the actions of Iran to ensure that they’re not on any watch list or a threat to our country.
“We’ve seen what happened in Brize Norton. We saw what happened in Cyprus at our military base yesterday, and we had people arrested, Iranian proxies were arrested over eight weeks ago.
“They’ll now go through criminal procedures under the Terrorism Act that the last Conservative government brought into place, because we’ve known for many years, which is why we brought those new legislations in that Iran is a state threat to this country. The state threats from Iran are so serious and significant.”
Asked why the Tories had not proscribed the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), she said: “I wasn’t in the last two conservative governments. We had a lot of work taking place, and in fact, on Palestinian Action, I absolutely want two things.
“One on IRGC, I absolutely put the files in to have the scrutiny and the processes in place. Because, of course, I was the one that prescribed Hamas in its entirety, and then secondly, on Palestinian action, I was the one that started the investigations into them.
“They were breaking into Israeli defence companies in our own country, they were participating in criminal activity on the streets of our country and on private property and premises. By the way, not only should action be taken against them, which I think the government may be announcing tomorrow, I think they should be subject to compensation orders for the damages that they have done. And by the way I literally pursued all of that when I was Home Secretary.”
Asked about her writing a forward to a Home Office report which “preposterously” concluded that British Pakistanis were not disproportionately involved in grooming gangs, she said: “Actually, in hindsight…we see so much more evidence that has come forward, and it is only through the further evidence effectively challenging of the institutional state failure that we’ve seen, certainly that applies to the Home Office.
“There’s no doubt about that, that applies to social services around the country and applies to health services around the country, it definitely applies to local government and local government leaders as well…there should have been so much more that took place in the past, not just to stop this, but to fast track prosecutions and for the state, parts of the state, to stop facilitating.”
