Billions of British pounds in public funds went to terrorist organizations, gangs - report

Billions of British pounds in public funds were channeled to hostile states, terrorist organizations, and criminal gangs between 2015 and 2021, according to an investigation by The Telegraph. A hidden government dossier, commissioned by the UK Cabinet Office but allegedly buried by the previous government to avoid political embarrassment, revealed the vast misappropriation of funds.

The report indicates that over GBP 28 billion went to entities deemed national security threats. This included grants to companies linked to Russia, COVID relief loans sent to Islamic State terrorists in Syria, and investments in research for companies associated with the Chinese military. British counter-terrorism funds also reportedly ended up in the hands of anti-Western extremists.

Dr. Rebecca Harding, CEO of the Center for Economic Security, described the findings as a wake-up call, emphasizing the growing importance of economic warfare and security. She stated that a lack of understanding regarding adversaries' intentions to project economic power has led to naivete in international dealings. The investigation also uncovered instances where funds went to criminal gangs and human traffickers claiming housing and disability benefits, with indications of overlap between these groups and countries hostile to Britain.

Sources suggested that an organized crime network, possibly backed by a hostile country, made significant efforts to acquire British public funds and encourage illegal immigration. The report was commissioned in 2023 after widespread fraud was discovered in government relief packages during the COVID-19 pandemic, and it is intended for international sharing.

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Economic warfare and economic security are more important than ever before – there have been threats from adversaries, state actors, and non-state actors that go through the business system. One of the problems is that we have assumed that everybody wants the same thing as us. What we haven’t realized is, when it comes to other countries... [some] want to project their economic power in a way that undermines our economic power. It is economic warfare, and we have been naive about all of this.