Thirty British men are among an estimated 2,000 foreign Isis fighters being held by Kurdish forces in jails in north-east Syria, according to the latest Whitehall analysis of the threat posed by the terror group following the death of its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.
The foreign fighters are considered the most dangerous group of all Isis fighters held in jails – totaling around 20,000, when Iraqis and Syrians are included – and politicians are effectively being warned not to be complacent just because the terror group has lost its leader and territory this year.
The figure of 2,000 is the first official British estimate of the number of foreign fighters in custody. Among those believed to be held in Syrian Kurdish detention include Shahan Choudhury, who left London in 2014 and was interviewed by ITV in prison earlier this year, saying he had acted as a grave digger during Isis’s last phase, burying victims of the conflict – and Hamza Parvez, a former police cadet from London
