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Report: Britain's MI5 misjudged Bali threats
LONDON, England (CNN) -- A parliamentary committee said Wednesday that British intelligence made a "serious misjudgment" assessing the threat to British interests in Indonesia before the October 12 terrorist attack on a Bali nightclub that killed more than 190 people, including 24 Britons. The report found that the security service MI5 should have raised its assessment of the threat to British nationals and interests in Indonesia before the attack. "This was a serious misjudgment and meant that the Security Service did not assess the threat correctly and, therefore, raise the level of threat to high," according to the report, prepared by Parliament's Intelligence and Security Committee. "However, we repeat, that on the available intelligence, we do not believe that the attack could have been prevented." The report followed one Tuesday by Australia's inspector general for intelligence and security that found officials there received no prior warnings about the Bali attack. Most of those killed were Australian tourists. The British report said: • Intelligence reports in May indicated an al Qaeda presence in Indonesia. • A September report indicated terrorists were discussing attacks on Americans and Britons in nightclubs. • An American diplomatic residence was the target of a failed grenade attack three weeks before the Bali attack. "None of these developments caused the Security Service to revise the threat level to general British interests in Indonesia," the report said. The report also sharply criticized travel advisories posted by the British Foreign Office. The committee said the advisory system, which ranks threats in a six-point range from "negligible" to "imminent," fails to highlight key points or risks. "Routine language is recycled from edition to edition and contains elements of reassurance that produce a confused effect. The terrorist threat to British citizens is not clearly identified, nor are the sensible precautions that could be taken by them clearly described," it said. The panel recommended a review of the system as "a matter of urgency."
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