It is believed no less than seventeen 22-year-old young men have recently joined armed groups in Blida (centre), some sources said. Investigations by the concerned authorities have confirmed a number of young men are missing for two months now and believe they would have joined armed groups. Last week, security forces in Blida contacted the young menÂ’s families to ask them about their sons. Some of them said they were abroad whereas others acknowledged they had no information about them since they had left home. Security services interrogated the young menÂ’s relatives in different areas of Blida but failed to get information confirming they joined armed groups. In relation to whether or not they had links with terrorist acts the area has known in recent years, the same sources told us the young men in question had never been implicated in terrorist acts, neither belonged to terrorist groups nor wanted by justice.
Considering global security trend in Blida these last few years, marked by decrease of terrorist acts, it is ruled out that remnant armed groups would recruit new elements to carry out terrorist attacks inside Algeria. Their focus would be now on training young men to fight out of Algeria, as in Iraq; especially as the young menÂ’s missing coincides with the announcement of the arrest of foreign elements related to armed groups in Algeria. They were working together to provide training for Algerians in order to send them fight in Iraq.