Russian intelligence reveals 1,500 terrorists arrived in Europe

Mohamed Abdel Ghaffar

The issue of foreign citizens who joined Daesh is still concerning the whole world, especially after the fall of the terrorist organization in Syria and Iraq, with questions rising about the destiny of these terrorist and whether their countries will allow them to return.

Nearly 1,500 foreign terrorists, who fought in the Middle East, have moved and are in Europe now, Director of Russia’s Federal Security Service Alexander Bortnikov said on Thursday.

“Some 1,500 out of 5,000 terrorists have arrived in the European Union from the Middle East, according to experts’ estimates. A significant number of them are gunmen, who have been sent by chieftains to Europe to continue terrorist attacks,” Bortnikov said during a conference on countering international terrorism.

“They managed to operate their forces based on a network principle. Interconnected and autonomous cells spread from the Middle East to Europe, Central and South East Asia, and major militant groups go deep into the African continent, in particular to Libya,” Bortnikov noted.

He also added that these terrorists still pose a serious threat and are determined to carry out their terrorist activities once more in their countries

Terrorist groups operating on a network basis are taking root in Europe, Central and South-Eastern Asia, the director of Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) warned. Organized groups of criminals for instance advance deep into Africa including Libya, the official said adding that the same can be said about Afghanistan.

According to Bortnikov, the driving force behind IS expansion is militants who are now returning to their countries of origin and creating terrorist cells at home. More than 1,500 out of 5,000 jihadists from Europe who earlier joined IS managed to come back from the Middle East, Bortnikov said citing expert estimates.

The lone wolves crisis is one of the most troubling issues for politicians around the world. Usually, most of these terrorists returned from areas of conflict in the Middle East after being heavily trained on modern warfare techniques.

Politicians in Europe have different points of view on how to deal with these individuals through several scenarios that include either to prevent their return to their countries again while leaving them to trail in the countries where they got arrested; providing support to countries that witnessed the rise of such terrorist organizations like Syria and Iraq in exchange for trying these terrorists; or to return them to their countries again and try them while providing them with the necessary support to ensure they do not get used by terrorist organizations again.