MI5 urges spies to come in from the closet

LONDON: In its latest bid to attract a broader range of applicants to combat the threat of Islamist terrorism since the London bombings three years back, British intelligence service MI5 is to recruit gay spies.

The agency has hired the country’s leading gay group, Stonewall, to help it recruit homosexuals and encourage spies to come out from the closet and open up about their sexuality, according to a senior British government official.

“The service (MI5) seeks to reflect the broad range of the United Kingdom society which it serves,” leading newspaper The Sunday Times quoted the unnamed government official at Whitehall as saying.

MI5’s decision to take in gays followed the success of its earlier drive to recruit British Muslims and speakers of Asian languages to fight the war against terror since July 7, 2005’s London bombings. Until the early 1990s, homosexuals were barred from sensitive government jobs because of fears that they would be vulnerable to blackmail.

Moreover, in the past gay staffers were nervous about revealing their orientation to colleagues because it might lead to claims that they had lied to recruiters when they joined.