Social security

European welfare benefits help fund ISIS fighters


Governments across Europe have accidentally paid taxpayer-funded welfare benefits such as unemployment funds, disability pensions and housing allowances to Islamic State militants who have used the money to wage war in Iraq and Syria, authorities and terrorism experts say.

Danish officials said this week that 29 citizens were given $100,000 in public pension benefits because they were considered too ill or disabled to work, and they then fled to Syria to fight for the radical group.

Denmark has one of the world's most generous social-welfare systems, which provides eligible unemployed people up to $120 a day. In addition to trying to reclaim the benefits accidentally disbursed, the government is trying to tighten legislation for welfare claims made by suspected militants.