Rabat – Spanish intelligence services are raising alarms over a mounting terrorist threat linked to the Polisario Front, as extremist factions in the Sahel expand their operations and deepen ties to radicalized individuals with European connections.
At the heart of the concern is the Islamic State’s West Africa Province (ISWAP), which has emerged as one of the most violent groups operating in the region.
Security sources cited by La Vanguardia indicate that some high-ranking members of the group are Sahrawis who spent their early years in the Tindouf camps and later participated in the “Holidays in Peace” program, which allowed them to spend summers in Spain.
Now fluent in Spanish, these individuals are believed to have the potential to encourage terrorist acts on European soil.
“These are not distant actors,” a Spanish intelligence official said. “They know our cities, our language, and our way of life.”
The link between terrorism and the Polisario Front, the separatist movement seeking to divide Morocco’s southern provinces, is now drawing new scrutiny.
Sources close to the counterterrorism community argue that the presence of radicalized Sahrawis in terror networks like ISWAP points to deeper ideological and operational overlaps.
Calls are growing in some quarters for Spain and its European partners to officially recognize the Polisario Front as a terrorist organization.
The threat is not limited to individuals. The broader picture shows a Sahel region descending into chaos, with Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger becoming ungovernable zones.
Terrorist groups there are no longer confined to isolated attacks. They now control vast rural territories and have shown the capability to destabilize state institutions.
While much of Europe’s attention remains on the war in Ukraine and the eastern front, Spain’s southern flank is becoming increasingly vulnerable. Terrorist cells could exploit both their proximity to the Iberian Peninsula and the well-established migratory routes.
In the past year, most migrants arriving in the Canary Islands have come from this region. Though most are fleeing conflict and poverty, the risk remains that terrorist networks could infiltrate these flows to move operatives toward European soil.
Spain’s Ministry of Defense has expressed regret over the withdrawal of European forces from the Sahel, seeing it as a strategic mistake. “We underestimated the long-term consequences of leaving a vacuum,” one official noted.
Though some analysts believe terrorist organizations in the region face internal leadership disputes and logistical challenges, the possibility of a shift in their strategy remains real, and dangerous.
Spanish police recently arrested two young Sahrawis from the Tindouf camps in the Basque Country’s Alava region, as concerns mount over radicalization within the camps. Authorities have charged the pair with collaborating with terrorist groups and promoting terrorism, according to multiple reports.
The arrests follow renewed calls from American policymakers and think tanks urging the US to officially classify the Polisario Front as a terrorist organization.
