Geneva : Swiss federal prosecutors said today they had opened criminal proceedings against a board member of Switzerland’s largest Islamic organisation accused of propaganda for jihadist groups, including Al-Qaeda, reports AFP.
The office of Switzerland’s attorney general said in a statement it had “opened a criminal proceeding against a member of the Board of Directors of the Islamic Central Council of Switzerland (ICCS), as well as against persons unknown,” for violating “the prohibition of groups like Al-Qaeda, Islamic State and similar organisations.” The German citizen is suspected of creating “for propaganda purposes” a video from a trip into parts of war-ravaged Syria, “without having explicitly distanced himself from Al-Qaeda activities” in the country, the statement said.
The man, who was not identified, had, among other things, interviewed “a senior member of the jihad umbrella organisation Jaysh al-Fath (“Army of Conquest”), of which the Syrian Al-Qaeda branch Jabhat al-Nusra (“Support Front”) is also a member,” it pointed out. ICCS could not be immediately reached for comment.
The announcement Saturday came a day after the Swiss government said it was significantly boosting the wealthy Alpine nation’s counter-terrorism forces, amid a heightened security alert in the wake of the November 13 attacks in Paris that left 130 dead. Authorities in Geneva have since last week been searching for possible extremists with links to the Islamic State (IS) group, with reports that US intelligence had identified a jihadist cell in the city.
