18 Percent of Mercenaries in Syria Are UK Citizens: Report

UK citizens make up the largest proportion of foreign mercenaries in Syria, according to a new report published by the International Centre for the Study of Radicalization.

The ICSR stated that 17.9% of gunmen in Syria were from the UK, based on their database of fighters identified from their social media accounts.

The UK-based ICSR is a non-governmental think-tank whose mission is to analyze and promote the understanding of political violence and radicalization.
The report indicated that Syrian militants from the West are using social media to interact with supporters and document their involvement in the conflict.

"Social media represents an essential source of information and inspiration to them. In their minds, social media is no longer virtual: it has become an essential facet of what happens on the ground," the report entitled 'Greenbirds: Measuring importance and influence in Syrian Foreign Fighter Networks' read.

The investigation said that they created a database of the social media profiles of 190 Western and European foreign gunmen. More than two thirds of these militants are affiliated with al-Nusra Front or the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), according to the report.
Although the lion's share of foreign gunmen in Syria are thought to be from the UK, numbers were as follows: France 11.6 percent, Germany 11.1 percent, Sweden 10 percent, Belgium 8.9 percent, and the Netherlands 6.3 percent.

Eastern European countries (including Albania, Bosnia, Bulgaria, Kosovo, Macedonia, and Serbia) comprised 9.6 percent of the sample, while non-European Westerners -- Australians, Canadians, and U.S. -- accounted for 5.3 percent. Nearly 19 percent of the sample population was coded as of unknown origin.

The UK Home Office have warned British citizens from going to fight in the conflict in Syria and said that those identified could have their nationality stripped, World Bulletin reported.