Italian police have arrested a Tajik member of the Islamic State (IS) terrorist group, according to a report by the ANSA news agency.
According to police in Rome, 32-year-old Ilhomi Sayrahmanzoda was arrested at the city’s Leonardo da Vinci–Fiumicino Airport after arriving on a flight from the Dutch city of Eindhoven. He had been wanted internationally since 2014 for fighting for IS in the war in Syria.
Italian police established that Sayrahmanzoda was still an active member of IS, and had been using various aliases, connected with passports of Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Ukraine, to hide from law enforcement agencies.
€2,000 in cash was confiscated from him, as well as a mobile phone, with which investigators are planning to identify whether Sayrahmanzoda had any connections in Italy.
“His arrival in Rome raises troubling questions: did he have anything planned here? Has he hired anyone before? Were they waiting for him? His citizenship was a key factor in his arrest on March 22 amid heightened tensions surrounding the Crocus City Hall bombing. However, so far, there are no elements that indicate his involvement in this movement,” the ANSA report said.
Italy is currently considering Tajikistan’s request to extradite Sayrahmanzoda. Italian interior minister Matteo Piantedosi said the arrest was “a very important result, the result of an effective preventive action against the threat of terrorism.”
