A 20-year-old Afghan man suspected of having links to a branch of the Islamic State group has been arrested in France, counterterrorism prosecutors said Saturday.
The man was accused of participation in a terrorist criminal organization and financing a terrorist company, reported the National Anti-Terrorist Prosecutor’s Office (PNAT).
The suspect, who was arrested in Lyon last week, was remanded in custody.
“He is suspected to have been in contact with IS-K (Islamic State in Khorasan),” the counterterrorism unit said.
The man is suspected of “sending funds” and helping to translate and transmit “the propaganda of this terrorist organization,” the PNAT added.
IS-K, the militant group’s Afghanistan branch, also operates in Pakistan and former Soviet countries in Central Asia, including Uzbekistan.
The group has been responsible for deadly attacks in Afghanistan and Russia, including an attack on a Moscow concert hall in March 2024 that killed 150 people.
According to the French newspaper Le ParisianThe Afghan, who arrived in France several years ago, was detained by agents of the DGSI internal intelligence agency when he was already in an administrative detention center in Lyon.
Le Parisian He said the suspect, already under investigation for glorifying terrorism, was editing and spreading extremist propaganda on the social media sites TikTok and Snapchat.
France has been repeatedly attacked by extremist attackers over the past decade, often by people inspired by Al Qaeda or the Islamic State group.
