The spy who came in from al-Qaeda - BBC

Aimen Dean is a founder member of al-Qaeda, who changed tack in 1998 and became a spy for Britain's security and intelligence services, MI5 and MI6. Interviewed by Peter Marshall, he describes his years working in Afghanistan and London as one of the West's most valuable assets in the fight against militant Islam.

Afghanistan - At home in Saudi Arabia Aimen Dean had been a Muslim theological prodigy. In Afghanistan it was his responsibility to train al-Qaeda recruits - many from Yemen - in the basics of Islamic theology and history and the essentials of religious practice. This opened his eyes to the jihadists' different motivations.

There is no single process of radicalisation. Some people, it took them years to be convinced of coming to the jihad and some people it took them minutes. Some people were studying in religious seminaries - they're a minority by the way - and then decided to come and some people basically just came straight out of a night club you know while he was consuming alcohol basically to come and seek redemption there in the jihadist world.

So you know you see immediately that you know there isn't one single classical journey there, that there are so many journeys.

Becoming a spy - Still barely out of his teens, and deeply troubled, Dean says he went to the Gulf for medical treatment, having privately decided not to return. Instead, he found himself in the hands of MI6. In 11 days, he says, he was turned. After four years and two months as a jihadi, he landed in London on 16 December 1998, and the debriefing began.

I think seven months of debriefings, that was more or less helping them put together a better picture of these organisations and the groups and who are the influential people within them.

Valued first by al-Qaeda and then British security and intelligence, Aimen Dean's life under cover came to an abrupt end when the cover was blown. An American writer disclosed his identity with details that could only be sourced to Dean. That was eight years ago.

This is an edited version of Peter Marshall's interview with Aimen Dean, which was broadcast on The Spy Who Came in from al-Qaeda, on BBC Radio 4 at 09:00 GMT on 3 March. You can catch up via the BBC iPlayer Radio.  -  Read More at BBC

جاسوس ام‌آی‌۶ که از القاعده آمده بود

The spy who came in from al-Qaeda

Aimen Dean's al-Qaeda story: dramatic but hard to swallow - telegraph