Supporters of the ISIL Takfiri terrorist group in Britain are coaxing British girls as young as 14 into becoming sex slaves for the militants operating in Syria, a report said.
London-based “facilitators” are helping the teenagers to apply for passports; funding and sometimes even accompanying them to the ISIL strongholds in Syria, the Evening Standard reported on Friday.
The report added that groups working particularly in the east of London are becoming hotbeds for young ISIL supporters to get into the conflict zone in Syria, press tv reported.
“The average age is being reduced. Some of the girls getting out there are only 14,” Haras Rafiq said, an expert at British counterterrorism think tank, the Quilliam Foundation.
“There are people here who have facilitated passports. Girls who are under a certain age are being accompanied by an adult over 18, usually a woman, to go help them. Help them apply for a passport, and even take them out there,” Rafiq added.
Earlier this month, police stopped a plane on the runway at London Heathrow Airport to remove a 15-year-old girl who was bound for Syria to join ISIL.
Officials had said the plane was bound for Istanbul but was ordered to turn around as it taxied down the runway.
The girl, who was from Tower Hamlets in east London, had secretly saved up to buy a ticket from London to Istanbul and planned to continue her journey through Turkey and over the border into Syria.
Dozens of young women are believed to be among more than 500 British people who have travelled to join ISIL in Syria and Iraq.
ISIL currently controls some parts of Syria and Iraq. They have carried out heinous atrocities in both countries, including mass executions and beheadings of people.