Officers belonging to the Policía Nacional arrested a minor in the province of Sevilla, thought to have intentions of carrying out a terrorist attack.

The teenager, of Syrian origin, was arrested in the town of Montellano in the early afternoon of Sunday. He is suspected of planning a suicide attack at his high school.

The arrested individual was repeating an ESO3-level class. Pupils in that level are normally aged 13 and 14, but he was repeating the course and is actually 16-years old.

He was surprised practicing with different kinds of explosive materials in an area of wasteland on the outskirts of Montellano, which has a population of around 7,000 inhabitants.

When the police searched his home on Calle Cuesta Bernardo, officers found prepared explosives and a bomb-vest similar to those used by suicide bombers. Consequently, they called in the bomb-disposal squad, TEDAX and sniffer dogs. There was also a handbook for producing homemade explosives.

The police spokesperson explained that the family of four had arrived in Spain as refugees from Syria in 2022 and that the mother was now a seamstress. However, the father had left and his two children lived with their mother, although they stayed with their father in Badajoz periodically.

The suspected jihadist teenager had been expelled from school the previous year for bringing a large knife to school. However, it was last October when he came to the attention of the anti-terrorist department because of his online comments and so they decided to  move in soon because of the level of radicalisation that he had shown online. However, it was when townsfolk complained of explosions on the wasteland that the police swooped, considering them to be a rehearsal.

The suspect will appear before a minors magistrate later today. The police are also considering arresting the mother as she had never reported that he had explosives at home and also because she had unwittingly bought some of the products (used in domestic chores) that her son had used to make the explosives.

Editorial comment: OK, this is a pretty confused teenager in a broken home, uprooted from his home country on the one hand, and on the other, could the police really afford to take the risk that he wouldn’t go through with an attack? Is it a cry for attention or something more sinister?

(News/Noticias: Montellano, Sevilla, Andalucia)