Guardia Civil arrest an individual in Biscay for spreading ideology of terrorist group DAESH on the Internet

On Wednesday, 26 July, officers from the Intelligence Service of the Guardia Civil arrested a 22-year old Moroccan, Y.I., in Balmaseda (Biscay), charged with the criminal offence of terrorism.

The detainee, who carried out his activities in a highly radicalised environment, had a Facebook profile through which he distributed the ideology of the terrorist group DAESH. The spread of the terrorist ideology was also backed up by images of the activities carried out by foreign terrorist fighters in Syria with whom he was in very close contact.

The Guardia Civil is currently searching the home of the detainee to collect evidence of his activities, which were mainly carried out by electronic means, and to identify other possible sympathisers of the terrorist group DAESH in Spain

Since 2013, the detainee has been spreading publications, which showed his degree of extremism, constantly referring to the Jihad and the armed fight in defence of Islam, glorifying DAESH terrorists as well as leaders of different Salafi-Jihadist terrorist groups, including Al-Qaeda, the al Nusrah Front (now referred to as Jabhat Fatah al Sham) and DAESH. In his profile, he praised the commission of terrorist attacks perpetrated by these Jihadist groups and even posting an annual reminder in commemoration of the 9/11 attacks in the United States.

Since 26 June 2015, the year in which the Ministry of Home Affairs raised the Counter-Terrorism Alert Level to level 4 (Spanish acronym: NAA-4), the law enforcement agencies have arrested a total of 186 Jihadi terrorists in operations carried out in Spain and abroad, and a total of 231 since the start of 2015.

The Ministry of Home Affairs sends out a reminder that, through the initiative STOP RADICALISMOS, citizens can collaborate through a series of channels open to them so that, in a confidential and secure manner, they can notify the State law enforcement agencies of possible cases of radicalisation in their vicinity through the web page www.stop-radicalismos.es, the mobile phone app for citizens security alerts 'Alertcops' and the free hotline 900 822 066.