The Moroccan authorities reported on Sunday the dismantling of two new cells “steeped in terrorist ideology” in the Nador region.

According to a statement from the Ministry of the Interior, these two cells were active in this area under the names “Al Mouahidine” and “Attaouhid”.

Their members—the number of whom is not specified—had notably carried out a series of thefts in the name of jihad (istihlal) and were in contact with radicals operating in northern Mali, the same source reports.

These members, among whom were “two former prisoners under the anti-terrorism law,” had “also forged links with extremist circles outside the national territory,” it is indicated.

They were arrested following an operation by the National Brigade of Judicial Police (BNPJ) and are currently being interrogated, according to the Ministry of the Interior.

In January, Mohand Laenser's department had described the proliferation of extremist networks as a “source of concern,” while announcing the dismantling of a cell working on the “recruitment and indoctrination of young Moroccans” with the aim of sending them to accomplish “Jihad within terrorist organisations linked to Al-Qaeda.”

A few weeks earlier, Morocco had already claimed to have dismantled several recruitment cells for Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), in the Rif or even the Fez region.