Weapons cache and hit list first of its kind in Spain says Home Office

THE Spanish Home Office has said that the hidden store of weapons discovered in Ceuta on April 9 represents a benchmark, since it is the first time that Daesh equipment and logistical information has been found in the country.

The official statement read: “This discovery implies a qualitative leap in terms of the fight against Jihadi terrorism in Spain, as it is the first known case involving creation of clandestine logistics and weapons structures with the aim of continued threat.”

According to the Home Office the arms could “possibly be linked to an old cell” that was planning to attack targets in the exclave.

Deleted information has been recovered from a USB pen drive unearthed alongside the arms, and according to the statement comprises instructions as to how the group should have been coordinated plus “generic information on potential targets.”

The list was not up-to-date and “at a very early stage,” continued the statement, but included details of targets to “achieve the group’s logistical aims.”

Identities of group members have not been released but all were related to “local Jihadi terrorism in Ceuta, without any element suggesting the existence of links” to mainland Spain.

“The Autonomous City of Ceuta is a strategic enclave with special sensitivity from the point of view of Jihadi terrorism both because of its particular historical, geographical and demographic conditions, and because of the existence of an abundance of high-interest strategic civil and military targets in the immediate surroundings.”

The Home Office also said that some group members may have already been arrested in unrelated investigations.