Local authorities in the city of Berkane arrested a 37-year-old alleged terrorist this Friday morning, believed to have been planning a terrorist attack as a member of ISIS.
Preliminary information provided by the ongoing investigation indicates that the apprehended individual was leading and coordinating a closed group on a social media platform, preaching “extremist goals and projects,” and “aiming to attract and recruit those imbued with extremist Muslim ideology,” said a statement from the Moroccan Central Office of Judicial Research.
The individual was recruiting “for the purpose of carrying out terrorist operations against Moroccan and foreign individuals on Moroccan soil.”
According to the statement, the suspect was also in contact with the alleged head of a terrorist cell, that authorities dismantled on March 25, 2021, in the city of Oujda, east of the country.
The suspected terrorist was “betting on his high technical training in the field of computer engineering to compromise automated data processing systems, to secure financial and logistical support” to carry out his terrorist activities.
The arrested extremist has been kept under custody at the authorities’ disposal in order to detect all extremist activities attributed to the concerned individual and to monitor his possible links with terrorist organizations located inside and outside Morocco.
This arrest is the result of “a close cooperation and coordination between the General Directorate of Territorial Surveillance (DGST) and competent US authorities, as the suspect’s identity was unveiled based on joint technical research and investigations with the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).”
This security operation indicates, according to the statement, “the continuation of the dangers of the terrorist threat facing our country, and embodies the importance of joint and advanced bilateral cooperation with The United States of America in the fight against terrorism and violent extremism.”
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