The shock figure is far lower than Ministers previously claimed and means almost 400 terrorists trained in Syria and Iraq are at large on Britain’s streets.
Experts told media on Sunday they could use the deadly skills with automatic weapons and bombs that they honed on the battlefield to plot atrocities such as the Paris and Brussels attacks in the UK, massacring hundreds.
Figures slipped out in Parliament reveal that the Home Office believes 850 Britons have travelled to fight for the ISIS terror group and although many have been killed by drone strikes and in battle, about 400 have sneaked back into the UK.
Any of them could be prosecuted as it is a crime to attend terrorist training camps and also to be a member of a banned group such as ISIS.
But Ministers admit that only 14 people who have fought for ISIS have been convicted, despite mistakenly claiming the number was 54 earlier this year.
Last night, critics urged Home Secretary Amber Rudd to give more money to the Border Force so it can catch terrorists as they sneak back into the country, as well as ensuring that police and MI5 have enough officers to track down those already here.
Labour MP Khalid Mahmood, who believes thousands of Britons have travelled to Syria and Iraq, said: ‘It is a tiny number who have been prosecuted and it’s absurd to say this is any form of success.
‘If they know who they are, they should be prosecuted but the police and security services don’t have the resources to do that.’
Professor Anthony Glees, Director of the Centre for Security and Intelligence Studies at the University of Buckingham, told The Mail on Sunday that the ‘minuscule’ number of prosecutions was ‘very disturbing’.
‘These people have been trained to be killers and people will think it beggars belief [that they haven’t been prosecuted]. What message are we sending out to the world?
Former Security Minister Lord West of Spithead said: ‘We know that people who have been abroad and radicalised are extremely dangerous, Daily Mail reported.
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