BarcelonaHalf a year ago, a man who received the nickname Sheikh –heque– arrived in Barcelona. The National Police had detected him in an operation for jihadist terrorism in the city that had ended with three detainees in January of this year who entered prison. Sheikh, according to the investigation, had acted as a “reference” who “coordinated security measures” from Algeria. But the National Police did not lose track of him and at the end of March they saw that he had settled in Barcelona. Since then, the agents have continued with the investigation, called Arbac, which this week has involved five arrests in the Catalan capital and in Madrid: the alleged leader and four young people he had captured – who were stealing and who would have become radicalized.
The General Information Commissariat of the National Police verified that Sheikh was linked to the Islamic State – DAESH, according to the acronym in Arabic – since 2016, when he was arrested in Turkey while trying to enter a conflict zone, in Syria and Iraq, to join the terrorist organization. After being released, he traveled to several countries, such as Malaysia, Tanzania and Algeria – where he is from and where he had served a sentence for acts related to terrorism – “where he continued to do recruitment tasks,” says the National Police. Once in Barcelona, the agents saw that he had surrounded himself with a group of young people who they define as “criminals” of Algerian origin who robbed, “in an organized manner”, tourists. “Since their arrival, several of them showed high signs of radicalization,” says the police force.
The agents also detected that the group wanted to buy a Kalashnikov rifle because it had begun to make arrangements to acquire them, which precipitated the arrests. That is why the National Police have arrested the leader – the sheik – along with four other members in recent days. Three arrests have been made in Barcelona, a fourth member is in a Catalan prison for other crimes and the fifth was found in a detention center for foreigners (CIE) in Madrid despite the fact that he also resided in the metropolitan area. All those arrested except the one who is imprisoned in Catalonia have passed to the disposition of the central investigating court number 6 of the National Court, which has agreed to enter prison. As for the already incarcerated, he is expected to make a statement in the next few days.
Operation video
Three 60-centimeter machetes
The National Police explains that in the records of the operation in recent days, in which they have entered three homes and the Catalan prison cell, they have found three machetes of 60, 57 and 51 centimeters in the sheikh’s home. The leader of the group also had about 70 cartridges in his home, although they have not located any kalashnikovs. The five detainees are accused of belonging to a terrorist organization and of self-indoctrination. The sheikh is also charged with a crime of active indoctrination.
This operation has been described as the second phase of the Arbac investigation, which in January involved the arrest of three more suspected jihadists in a squatted home in Barceloneta. On that occasion, the National Police verified that an Islamic State soldier who had been in Iraq, Turkey and Senegal had been installed in the city, considered “potentially dangerous”.
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