Man jailed for being ISIS member was spying for Denmark, court rules

Danish man of Syrian origin had denied being a terrorist despite conviction in Spain

Ahmed Samsam gives a statement outside Denmark's Supreme Court in Copenhagen. AFP

A Danish man of Syrian origin who was jailed for having spent time with ISIS was in fact an informant for Danish intelligence services, a court ruled on Tuesday.

The ruling paves the way for Ahmed Samsam, 35, to seek a reversal of his 2018 conviction in Spain for being a member of the terrorist group. The case has captivated Denmark for years and shone an embarrassing spotlight on its intelligence agencies.

Since Samsam's case emerged in 2018, Denmark's two intelligence services had refused to confirm or deny the identity of their informers for security reasons. But on Tuesday, the country's Supreme Court ordered them to reveal the truth.

I don't know which monkeys have been running the show over there but they really made a big mistake

Ahmed Samsam

"The Danish Security and Intelligence Service (DSIS) and the Danish Defence Intelligence Service (DDIS) must acknowledge that, in connection with his trips to Syria in 2013 and 2014, 'A' collaborated with intelligence services, and that he received fees and other compensations in exchange for providing information on Danish fighters in Syria to the intelligence services," the Supreme Court said in its verdict.

The two agencies published a public admission within hours of the court ruling. A lawyer for the intelligence agencies called Tuesday's ruling "regrettable".

Samsam was handed an eight-year sentence by the Madrid court that convicted him. He served most of his time in prison in Denmark after being transferred, and was released in 2023.

He had denied any terrorist activity, and his claim had been backed by several testimonies and journalistic investigations, which were presented to a lower Danish court that tried to establish whether or not he was a Danish intelligence agent. He lost that case, before the Supreme Court ruled in his favour.

It found that he had explained "in detail, in a coherent and meaningful manner" how he had been recruited, and that he had documented cash and bank transfer payments, the identity of his recruiters, his training and meeting places.

"Our main goal is to pursue the matter in Spain. We need to think carefully about the best steps to take to do so," Samsam's lawyer Rene Offersen told reporters outside the courthouse. The case has enthralled Danes for five years.

"I have a lot of confidence in the Danish courts, but I never thought it would take this long," Samsam said as he left the courthouse. "Especially not after the media started covering the story in 2020," he added.

The affair has left the intelligence agencies red-faced. Samsam said that could have been avoided if the agencies had backed him up in 2018.

"I don't know which monkeys have been running the show over there but they really made a big mistake and they have handled it like amateurs," he said. "The fact that they let it get so public, they can only blame themselves."

Before Tuesday's verdict, Frederik Waage, a law professor at the University of Southern Denmark, said an admission by intelligence agencies that Samsam was an agent would have been "a sensation" and "would interfere with the operations of the Danish intelligence agencies in a way not seen before".

Aside from the ISIS charge, Samsam still faces other legal problems. On Monday, Copenhagen's court of appeals upheld a three-month sentence against him for violence against a law enforcement officer.