CUMBRIA could lose firearms officers as police and security services investigate at least four active terror plots in the UK.

An "unprecedented surge" in Islamist extremism has sparked a major probe in Britain's main cities The Sunday Times has reported that a current review by the National Police Chiefs’ Council, which involves Chris Sims, the former West Midlands police chief, is expected to redeploy firearms officers from rural areas to major cities deemed to be at greater threat of terrorism.

Areas of the country likely to lose officers include Cumbria, Wiltshire, Dorset, Devon and Cornwall, Norfolk, Lincolnshire and North Yorkshire.

The review, which started in March when Theresa May was home secretary and is now being overseen by Amber Rudd, is being pushed through quickly as a result of the heightened terror threat and is expected to report in October.

It is examining a raft of changes to policing, including how best to combat “marauding terrorist attacks”.

A senior intelligence told the national newspaper: “There’s four or five cases where there is a sense of a plot, where they are planning and plotting and intending to commit an act of terrorism rather than just being extremists.” Last week Ben Wallace, the new security minister, held talks with retail bosses and operators of sporting venues to review security at stadiums and shopping centres, including the Westfield complexes in London, after the recent terror attacks in France and Germany.

“In light of events in Germany and France, the government is keen to ensure that shopping centres and sports stadiums where there are large crowds are getting the support they require,” said Wallace. Richard Walton, head of Scotland Yard’s counterterrorism command until January this year, said the surge in terrorist attacks this month in mainland Europe — including the one in Nice on Bastille Day in which 84 people were killed and more than 300 injured — was unprecedented.

“No doubt about it, we have had an Isis-inspired terrorism surge in the last four weeks,” he said.

“And it is unprecedented. It is unprecedented outside the usual places, such as Baghdad in Iraq and in Syria. It is not the norm.”

Walton said Isis was likely to increase its attacks on the west as it continues to lose the battle against coalition forces in Syria and Iraq.

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