Two French girls arrested for alleged jihad activities

Two French girls aged 15 and 17 were taken into custody on Tuesday for their alleged involvement in jihad activities.

Reuters/Stringer

The two girls who were arrested in Tarbes (Hautes-Pyrénées) and Lyon (Rhone) are being questioned as part of an investigation into criminal terrorist activities.
The girls were both preparing to join jihad activities in Syria. They know each other through social media.

Samuel Laurent, an international security consultant based in Paris told RFI that this is not an isolated case. “Obviously this is proof of how appealing caliphate ideology is for French and European citizens,” he says.

The French government introduced a bill at the beginning of July to fight the threat of terrorism on French soil.

According to Sebastien Pietrasanta, who presented the bill to parliament, 343 French nationals are currently fighting in Syria. This number includes seven minors and fifty women. Thirty-three French fighters have been killed in Syria.

Samuel Laurent also told RFI that the French government policies are limited in addressing this problem on home soil.

“When the government speaks about Iraq and speaks about Syria, our president tries to organize some conference to deal with the problem over there, because it is much easier to deal with the problem in Syria and Iraq, then it is to deal with the problem here in France,” he says.

Most of the European fighters that are taking part in the Syrian war come from France. There are about 1,500 European fighters in Syria.