Rabat – The Central Bureau of Judicial Investigation (BCIJ) has arrested three people in Martil and Boulaouane in El Jadida belonging to an Islamic State (ISIS) terrorist cell that was dismantled on January 27 in El Jadida, Morocco’s Ministry of Interior said in a communiqué on Monday.
The ministry said that “the BCIJ’s current investigation of thedismantled El Jadida cell led to the arrest of three individuals involved in the terrorist plans of this cell, which had been planning to target several sensitive sites, hotels and commercial centers and assassinate political figures with explosives and firearms.”
Regarding the cell’s weapons that the BCIJ confiscated, the ministry said that “scientific analysis carried out upon the confiscated materials [revealed them to be] chemical preparations for the manufacture of explosives and belt explosives.”
The ministry added that “the cell was about to receive an explosive expert from IS in Libya in order to teach them booby-trapping techniques and remote detonation,” noting that this cell had been planning to form a base for ISIS in Boulouane, near El Jadida, under the name of “Islamic State’s Branch in Morocco.”
The ministry stated that the detainees will be appear in court after the termination of the investigation. AbdelHak El Khiyame, the head of the BCIJ, said that the weapons had “entered Morocco via Algeria, but that their delivery was coordinated from an ISIS branch in Libya.”
The confiscated weapons had included firearms, a submachine gun equipped with infrared lenses, seven pistols, massive munitions, four large-sized knives, and two wireless devices, in addition to military trousers, stick handlers and suspicious chemical materials used in the manufacture of explosives, said the ministry in a previous communiqué.
