An ISIS jihadi who is one of France’s most wanted after being convicted of running a recruitment network in the country has been arrested in northern Syria, according to French media.
More than three French nationals were stopped in the arrests by Kurdish YPG militia on December 17, including Thomas Barnouin, according to French news channel LCI.
Barnouin, 36, was sentenced to five years in prison in 2009 for running a jihadi recruitment network in the southwestern Toulouse region. It is believed he went to Syria in 2014 to join ISIS.
He was close to Mohammed Merah, a gunman who killed seven people in the area in 2012, including three Jewish children.
Thomas Barnouin, one of France’s most-wanted, was arrested in northern Syria in the Hassakeh area with other French nationals on December 17 (file photo)
‘Several French (nationals) were arrested in northern Syria in the Hassakeh area, near the Iraqi border,’ the source said.
Two of the other French nationals captured were Romain Garnier, 33, from Vesoul and Thomas Collange.
Barnouin 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 public prosecutor declined to comment. 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.
France’s foreign minister said on December 9 that Paris estimated the number of French jihadists still in the region at about 500.
It is unclear whether those caught in Iraq and Syria will be returned to their home country, although French officials have said they expect all adults to face local justice.
Barnouin, 36, was sentenced to five years in prison in 2009 for running a jihadi recruitment network in the southwestern Toulouse region (file photo)
It is believed he went to Syria in 2014 to join ISIS. He was close to Mohammed Merah, a gunman who killed seven people in Toulouse in 2012, including three Jewish children