UK aid cash ‘went to Syrians who then handed it to jihadists’

BRITISH foreign aid money has been used to fund a police force whose officers handed cash to extremists and stood by and watched as a woman was stoned to death, it was alleged, as the Government suspended the project.

The Free Syrian Police (FSP), a flagship, Uk-backed scheme, is said to have had officers hand-picked by a branch of al-qaeda and handed over cash in a protection racket to Nour aldin al-Zenki, the extremist group. Dead or fictitious officers have been discovered on the payroll of the force, which was intended to bring law and order to parts of the country controlled by opponents of the Assad regime.

After the claims by BBC’S Panorama, the Government suspended all aid to the £12million project, which was first set up five years ago.

Crispin Blunt, the Tory MP and former chairman of the foreign affairs committee, said: “You’ve got people being sentenced to death for homosexuality. Clearly, that is completely and utterly unacceptable by any standard and the idea that British taxpayers’ money was associated with that would, of course, be wholly abhorrent.”

The investigation alleges that policemen have been working with courts accused of torture and summary executions and with those run by Jabhat al-nusra, the Syrian arm of al-qaeda. In one area, the group hand-picked two officers. In another case, police officers from the FSP were present when two women were stoned to death near Sarmin in December 2014. Sources claim the officers closed a road so that the execution could take place.

Britain is one of six donor countries that pays for the project. Boris Johnson, the Foreign Secretary, announced in April that the UK would commit a further £4 million – funds that may now be withdrawn.

A spokesman for Adam Smith International (ASI), which has been running the project since October 2014, said: “We have managed taxpayers’ money effectively to confront terrorism, bring security to Syrian communities and mitigate the considerable risks of operating in a war zone.”

ASI said it refuted Panorama’s allegations, while a government spokesman said it was taking the allegations “extremely seriously” and that an investigation had begun.

Panorama: Jihadis You Pay For, will be aired tonight on BBC One at 7.30pm.