According to newspaper Diário de Notícias (DN), Hicham el Hanafu was caught by police over the weekend in two separate operations staged in Marseilles and Strasbourg.
The 26-year-old Moroccan national who lives in Aveiro, was handed residency and a driver’s licence by Portuguese authorities after successfully arguing that he was facing political persecution from his government.
He was issued his permit to reside here in 2014 for a period of five years. His residency card would have allowed him to travel freely within the EU’s Schengen zone without any restrictions.
Despite his status as a refugee, he was placed under surveillance by Portugal’s PJ police and the counter terrorism unit on suspicion of recruiting members for the so-called Islamic state. Despite the close surveillance, authorities here failed to connect him to any suspicious activity.
Hicham el Hanafu was arrested alongside six other alleged jihadists following eight months of investigations in France.
French police believe the group were working towards orchestrating a series of separate but simultaneous terrorist attacks.
In comments to DN, a police source revealed that Hanafi used “Portugal as a base and a starting point to travel across Europe, especially Marseilles, where he was spotted on a number of occasions.”