Been thinking on this engine thing overnight. A few things spring to mind as possibilities in addition to what has already been mentioned.
1/ By having the engines closer to the centreline rather than on the wing, this might enable one engine to be shut down once sufficient fuel has been burned off or weapons dropped to further increase its loiter capability. By being closer to the centreline they may not have to worry to much about any asymetric thrust issues and associated tricky computer remote control of the flight characteristics that would be there if the engines were on the wings and one was shut down.
2/ Maybe they haven’t firmed up on the wing design yet. If they are on a tight budget as is suggested then having to integrate engines into each variation of a wing design might be expensive. If you remember the Corax/Raven, that appeared with two completely different wings as they fulfilled different rolls, but the central core looked to be the same. BAE could just be hedging their bets and reducing complexity and cost like this when they may be planning other experimental derivatives with slightly different wings.
3/ If its meant to operate in forward positions there may be the issues of FOD to consider on poor runways so perhaps the high mounted position is an attempt to reduce wear and tear.
I am not an engineer only an enthusiastic spanner monkey so no doubt you folks can think of some better reasons.
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