Madrid, July 4 (IANS/MAP) Spanish police have detained a radicalised individual suspected of disseminating extremist propaganda of the Islamic State (IS) terror group.
The suspect, a 31-year-old man of Moroccan origin, was arrested on Tuesday in Collado Mediano, a mountain town located in the Madrid region, some 48 km northwest of the Spanish capital.
According to reports, the suspect used anonymous browsers to access and gather extremist content on encrypted pages in the so-called deep web, which he then propagated in Spain.
Security agents were conducting searches on the man's property to gather potential evidence of his prolific use of social media through which he was suspected of maintaining contacts within Spain as well as abroad.
Agents from the European Union's law enforcement agency, Europol, participated in the arrest and were working to establish the exact scope of the suspect's international network of contacts.
The Interior Ministry in a statement highlighted the importance of tackling terrorist propaganda online, considering that groups such as the IS and Al Qaeda boast a multitude of Internet platforms aimed at spreading their message, recruiting and giving orders to would-be militants.
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Spain's terror alert status has been at its second-highest level since June 2015.
--IANS/MAP
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