Two arrested in an anti-terrorist operation in Melilla

The National Police have arrested two individuals linked to jihadist terrorism in the Melilla neighbourhood of La Cañada de Hidum during an anti-terrorist raid that began early this morning. The two arrested were involved in recruitment, according to Cadena SER de Melilla, and are being transferred to the mainland aboard a National Police plane, according to El Faro de Melilla.

Police sources have told the EFE news agency that the agents have carried out several house searches. Other media have indicated the Vía Láctea area as the place where the searches were carried out. The operation is being led and coordinated by the Melilla Police Headquarters, while the General Information Commissariat is in charge of directing and coordinating it.

This is not the first anti-terrorist operation to be carried out in the Melilla neighbourhood. According to El Faro de Melilla, in March 2014 the National Police arrested three men accused of organising trips to join Daesh in Syria. Mustafa Maya Amaya, sentenced to 8 years in prison in 2018, was one of those arrested. The jihadist confessed before the Audiencia Nacional to having sent more than 200 people to fight in the Middle East. The other four members of the cell, Paul Audren Lawrence Cadic, Sylvain Bertrand Guillaume Decker, Farid Cheikh and Davide de Angelis, were sentenced to six years in prison.

A few months later, in June, Operation Javer led to the arrest of six people, all linked to the Blanca de la Cañada mosque. Those arrested are serving a six-year prison sentence after admitting in court that they were recruiting fighters. Several mosques in the neighbourhood, as reported by La Razón, have produced individuals who joined Daesh in Iraq and Syria.

At the end of January, the National Police arrested the leader of a jihadist cell in Algeciras and three more people linked to the one arrested in Murcia.