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Dutch Expert: Islamic State has 60-80 operatives in Europe to carry out attacks

19 November 2016 11:20 (UTC +04:00)

Baku – APA. Intelligence experts estimate that the Islamic State extremist group has 60 to 80 operatives planted in Europe to carry out attacks, the Dutch counterterrorism coordinator said Friday, Voice of America reports.

Dick Schoof said in an interview with The Associated Press that would-be fighters are also heeding messages from the militant group “asking them not to come to Syria and Iraq, but to prepare attacks in Europe.”

One result is that over the last six months the number of foreign terrorist fighters hasn’t grown, he said, but the fact that they’re not traveling “does not mean that the potential threat of those who would have traveled is diminished.”

Schoof said military operations to oust the Islamic State from its self-declared caliphate in Syria and Iraq are scattering the extremist group’s fighters and supporters.

There are probably 4,000 to 5,000 European foreign terrorist fighters in Iraq and Syria, Schoof said.