Army scientists ‘deployed in UK’

BBC NEWS
Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Scientists from Porton Down have been deployed in the UK a “number of times this year”, the government’s head of counter-terrorism has told MPs.

The lab mainly specialises in nuclear and biological warfare but the reason for the deployments is not known.

Brigadier Chip Chapman told a committee of MPs he could not go into details for national security reasons.

(ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW)

The Commons defence committee is probing the UK’s level of readiness for a terrorist or other emergency.

Lord West said ministers did not know the location and capability of all deployable troops in the UK at any one time but he was confident they could find out “straight away” in the event of an emergency.

The security minister said government agencies were now better informed about the counter-terrorism forces and scientific capabilities available to them – and a compendium had been made available to officials.

Brigadier Chapman told MPs “immediate response” teams from the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) had been deployed on a number of occasions in the past year.

“The number of occasions they have been used and the circumstances I can not go into in this forum,” said Brig Chapman, director of counter-terrorism and UK operations at the ministry of defence.  

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