'Shift focus' of security battle

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Attempts to maintain national security need to be redefined, with more attention being paid to climate change and poverty, a think tank has said.

In a report, the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) said a strategy based solely on preventing military or terrorist attacks was redundant.

It said the power to control security environments is "slipping beyond the reach of governments acting alone".

The government is to set out the UK's security strategy in the next week.

The report is the first from the IPPR's Commission on National Security, which is jointly chaired by Lord Robertson, the former secretary general of Nato, and the former Liberal Democrat leader Lord Ashdown.

In it, the left-leaning think tank urges the government to do more to protect people from other potential threats.

Ian Kearns, IPPR deputy director and report author, said: "The world has changed and notions of security that helped protect us in the 20th century are no longer able to protect us in the 21st century.

"Terrorism is a very real threat but we must not allow it to dominate discussion about national security. The frontline in the battle for security today is more complex than ever before."