Britain on Thursday called on the United States to take down websites used by extremists and urged more concerted action to thwart militant threats before resorting to war.
Al Qaeda’s leaders in Pakistan have shown “startling resilience” and their affiliates have both the intent and the capability to strike the West, British Minister of Security Pauline Neville-Jones said.
Overall, Britain’s new national security strategy is evolving “against the background of a global context that we do not assess as especially favourable to Western interests,” Neville-Jones said in remarks prepared for delivery at the Brookings Institution, a Washington research group.
She voiced concern about permitting websites used by extremists such as the preacher Anwar al Awlaqi to recruit anti-Western forces.
“The websites in which feature his terrorist message would categorically not be allowed in the UK,” she said. “If they were hosted in the UK they would be taken down.”
But Neville-Jones said many such sites were hosted in the United States. She said Britain wanted to work closely to find ways of thwarting them despite freedom-of-speech issues.
President Barack Obama’s administration defended its approach as reflecting the right balance between competing interests, including using such sites as a source of intelligence and as an example of Internet freedom that can ultimately reduce violent political extremism.
“Where activities on the Internet pose a clear threat to the public, the U.S. government has significant legal authorities to act as needed to protect the public,” said State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley.
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