THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) – The large number of radicalized Muslim extremists across Europe, their lack of command structure and growing sophistication make it “extremely difficult” for law enforcement agencies to foil every terror attack, the head of European Union police agency Europol said Friday.
Europe’s security and law enforcement agencies need to cooperate more closely to prevent attacks like last week’s deadly rampage in Paris, Europol chief Rob Wainwright told The Associated Press in an interview.
“The scale of the problem, the diffuse nature of the network, the scale of the people involved make this extremely difficult for even very well-functioning counterterrorist agencies such as we have in France to stop every attack,” Wainwright said.
At least 2,500 and possibly up to 5,000 suspects have traveled from Europe to conflicts in Syria and Iraq, he said.
“The sheer numbers of people involved, the way in which they’ve been radicalized on the Internet, radicalized by their engagement in the conflict in Syria and Iraq, makes this extremely difficult for the police to contain it in a complete way,” he said.