Suspected French Islamist militants arrested in Syria

One of France’s most-wanted jihadists, Thomas Barnouin, is amongst several suspected French Islamist militants arrested in northern Syria

Several suspected French Islamist militants have been arrested in northern Syria, including a man once convicted of running a jihadist recruitment network in France.

The Syrian Kurdish YPG militia detained three men on 17 December.

“Several French (nationals) were arrested in northern Syria in the Hassakeh area, near the Iraqi border,” a source said.

One of France’s most-wanted jihadists, Thomas Barnouin, is amongst the captured. He was captured with two other French converts to Islam - Romain Garnier and Thomas Collange. The three were with Islamic State.

Barnouin, 36, is believed to be linked to a French jihadist cell that included Mohamed Merah, who murdered seven people in the Toulouse area in 2012.

Barnouin is described as a veteran IS member, who had been arrested by Syrian soldiers in 2006 while en route to Iraq with another French jihadist, Sabri Essid.

After being handed over to the French authorities, both were jailed for five years in 2009. But after his release in 2014, Barnouin went to fight for IS in Syria, accompanied by his wife and children.

He is also close to brothers Fabien and Jean-Michel Clain, who were identified by officials as the voices in a jihadist audio message claiming Islamic State’s responsibility for attacks in Paris that killed 130 people in 2015.

The French government had said that about 1,700 French citizens have joined IS in Iraq and Syria since the start of 2014, and 278 of them have been killed. An estimated 302 have returned to France.

The French interior ministry said it could neither deny nor confirm the arrests.

The head of France’s DGSI internal intelligence agency, Laurent Nunez, warned in November that security services were still worried militants could continue to plan attacks in France from Syria and Iraq despite Islamic State’s loss of territory.