By KUNA,
London : Emergency plans have been drawn up over fears that a prison officer could be taken hostage by Muslim fanatics inside Britains jails, according to a report here Monday.
The dossier has been compiled in the past few months amid mounting racial tension in the UK prison system, The Daily Mail newspaper said.
It details the action to be taken in the event of the “worst case scenario”.
A senior prison source told the daily that it was “a real live threat”.
With the number of “terrorist” inmates predicted to grow tenfold in the next decade from 130 to to 1,600, concerns have been expressed over security within the UKs already overcrowded jails.
There are fears some inmates could become even more radicalised as racial tensions escalate, the paper added.
Intelligence gathered from within Britains eight top security jails claims specific threats to kidnap and behead a prison officer first surfaced six months ago at Whitemoor Prison in Cambridgeshire, southern England.
But sources said the growing concern over security and the threat to prison officers is not confined to any one jail.
“This is a threat faced by officers in prisons across the country”, said the source.
“It is is widespread and an escalation of the tension inside the prison system”.
“This is why the prison service is preparing direct intervention if ever a prison officer is taken hostage”.
Details of the contingency plans emerged just days after a Muslim prisoner at Frankland Prison, in County Durham, northern England, claimed they would kidnap and execute an officer and film it on mobile phones.
The threat was made during a four-hour riot in the prisons segregation unit last weekend.
Nine inmates went on the rampage causing 20,000 pounds of damage while demanding that they be transferred to another prison.
Last June, 60 inmates fought running battles after the cell of a convicted al-Qaeda terrorist who stabbed a police officer to death, was set ablaze.
Five prison officers were injured during the violence.
Sources there said the prison is like a powder-keg juist waiting to go off, adding that the tension is rising daily.