Christians Under Attack

By Sinikka Tarvainen,
Madrid- While the international spotlight is on 29 suspects
on trial for the 2004 Madrid train bombings, Spanish police are
working behind the scenes to counter a growing threat of new attacks.
Radicals inspired by al-Qaeda have stepped up propaganda and
recruitment activities in Spain, a country they claim as a part of
the Islamic world because of its Muslim past, according to police
experts.

Extremists present in Spain no longer come just from North Africa,
but also from Pakistan.

Spain has become one of the main bases for the recruitment of
suicide bombers, some of whom are trained at new al-Qaeda bases in
Africa's Sahel zone before they are sent to Iraq.

The ongoing Madrid bombings trial has given a face to Islamist
terrorism as Spaniards have watched one suspect after another take
the stand, from bearded fundamentalists to young men with an
apparently Western lifestyle.

After questioning the suspects, the court is currently hearing
police experts and other witnesses.

Ten bombs that exploded on four Madrid commuter trains killed 191
and injured nearly 2,000 people in March 2004, suddenly placing
Islamists on top of the security agenda, ahead of the armed Basque
separatist group ETA.

Two groups are suspected of involvement in the attacks: the
Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group (GICM) and the extremely radical
Tafkir Wal Hijra, which is of Egyptian origin.

Such groups do not form part of a hierarchical structure, but heed
messages emanating from al-Qaeda and act on their own.

Arab activists are believed to cooperate with Pakistanis making
money transfers on their behalf.

Pakistani radicals are active especially in the north-eastern
Catalonia region, where police have detected the presence of Asian
groups such as the Jaish-e-Mohammed (JEM) and Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET).

The JEM has been implicated in the 2005 bombings in the London
transport network, while the LET is linked with attacks in India.

Police are investigating whether the Arabs and Pakistanis have
contacts with Chechen Muslims, large numbers of whom reportedly
arrived in Spain in 2006.

Islamist radicals proselytize at an estimated 10 per cent of
Spain's hundreds of unofficial mosques, which operate in garages,
basements and the like.

Fighters recruited in Spain are no longer trained only in Iraq and
Afghanistan, but also in Sahel countries such as Mali, Niger and
Mauritania, where al-Qaeda and its allies teach them to handle
weapons, explosives and even poisons, according to the daily El Pais.

The young men then travel to conflict zones such as Iraq, where
one of the Madrid train bombers is believed to have died in a suicide
attack in 2005.

Those who are not killed in Iraq or are unable to enter the
country sometimes return to Spain, where they constitute one of the
potentially most dangerous groups, according to police sources.

The Madrid bombers targeted Spain partly to punish the then
government for its participation in the Iraq war.

Spain has changed its Atlanticist foreign policy since then, but
the presence of its troops in Afghanistan and its judicial crackdowns
on Islamists keep it on al-Qaeda-inspired hit lists.

Islamist websites have also long called for a reconquest of al-
Andalus, a Moorish name for Spain, parts of which were ruled by
Muslims for nearly eight centuries until 1492.

Recently, some websites have also begun campaigning for the
"liberation" of the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla on the
Moroccan coast, causing concern among police experts.