France:Toulouse; 400 extremists in Europe,EU anti-terrorism
''Single actors'' like Merah difficult to monitor
Sunday, 25 March 2012
(ANSAmed) - BRUSSELS, MARCH 23 - There are about 400 Islamic extremists trained by Al Qaeda in Europe, with most of them in Germany, France, Great Britain and Belgium, according to the EU anti-terrorism coordinator Gilles De Kerchove.
He went on to say that the European monitoring system has a number of faults that make keeping an eye on the individuals most at risk difficult.
The expert said that there is no European data archive for airline passengers, making it almost impossible for the secret services of different countries to know the exact number of people who have undertaken ''dangerous'' trips to countries at risk like Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Moreover, the problem that leads to such incidents like the one in Toulouse is that the ''weakened'' Al Qaeda is relying ever more on ''single actors'' often recruited online or in prisons, ever more difficult to individuate.
De Kerchove said that EU countries should step up collaboration, and that the latter should not be restricted to ''financial flow control''.
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