Tunisia security forces seek to block returning extremists

More than 5,000 Tunisians are believed to have joined extremist militant groups and about 800 have returned.

Tunisians shout slogans during a demonstration outside parliament in Tunis against allowing Tunisians who joined extremist groups to return to the country, on December 24, 2016. Fethi Belaid /AFP

Tunis // Tunisia’s security forces on Sunday called on the government to take “exceptional measures” to combat the return of citizens fighting for extremist groups abroad.

“The return of terrorists from hotbeds of unrest is worrying and could lead to the Somalisation of the country,” the internal security forces’ national union said, referring to the collapse of Somalia and its division into warring tribes and factions in the 1990s and the presence of Al Shabab extremists that threatens its recovery today.

Battle-hardened fighters “have received military training and have learnt to use all sorts of sophisticated weapons”, it said.

The warning came a day after Tunisian authorities said they had arrested three members of terrorist cell people including the nephew of Anis Amri, a Tunisian who had pledged allegiance to ISIL and who drove a lorry into a crowded Christmas market in Berlin last Monday, ki.

Tunisia has witnessed a number of extremists attacks since its 2011 revolution, including on foreign tourists, and the United Nations estimates there are more than 5,000 Tunisians fighting for extremist outfits, mainly in Iraq and Syria.

Hundreds of people gathered outside parliament in Tunis on Saturday to protest against letting these militants back in the country.

On Friday, interior minister Hedi Majdoub told parliament that 800 citizens who had fought for extremist groups abroad had since returned to the country.

President Beji Caid Essebsi said this month the government would refuse to pardon Tunisians who fought for extremist groups but could not stop them from coming home.

“Many of them want to return, and we can’t prevent a Tunisian from returning to his country,” he said, “but we will be vigilant.”

Following criticism in the press and on social media, Mr Essebsi later said “we will not be indulgent with the terrorists”.

* Agence France-Presse