ISIS war in Europe

He said: "Europe is currently facing the highest terror threat in more than ten years.

"We can expect ISIS or other religious terror groups to stage an attack somewhere in Europe with the aim of achieving mass casualties among the civilian population."

The growing number "presents EU member states with completely new challenges", warned the former senior player in the British National Criminal Intelligence Service (NCIS).

But he played down fears that Islamist terrorists are using the European migrant crisis to infiltrate the continent as asylum seekers.

He said: "There is no concrete evidence terrorists are systematically using the flow of refugees to infiltrate Europe."

This week it emerged two men being held in Austria in connection with the November Paris attacks confessed to coming into Europe posing as refugees.

The duo sneaked through the continent after arriving in Greece on a boat with 30 to 40 others, including two of the jihadi gunman who carried out the slaughter on the streets of the French capital.

Salzburg prosecutors confirmed the 28-year-old Algerian and 34-year-old Pakistani suspects, who have not been named, were arrested at a refugee shelter on December 10.

They were stopped weeks before the bloody atrocity by officials who noticed they were travelling on false passport. But the eventual attackers slipped through the net, taking advantage of the Schengen free-movement zone to ghost on towards France.

Prosecutors today denied reports the pair had admitted they were meant to take part in the attacks which killed 130 people, but said they are being held in connection with the horrific terror attack.

A further two suspects, a 25-year-old Moroccan an a 40-year-old Algerian were arrested a week later by Austrian authorities for being in close contact with the first two suspects, officials confirmed.

A statement said: "It can be assumed that all four are members of ISIS."

The original two arrested were held by Greek authorities for 25 days after arriving in Europe but were later allowed to continue their journey, raising serious questions over the ability of the Greeks to securely police the continent's borders.

(dailystar.co.uk)