US official confirms Jihadist concerns conveyed to Europe
A US government official on Thursday confirmed that Washington has expressed its concern to Greek and other European authorities about the flow of radical Islamists into Syria and Iraq.
Asked whether the US government has asked Athens to arrest suspected members of the so-called Islamic State (IS) believed to have traveled to Greece from Bosnia and Albania, State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki told a news briefing on Thursday, “We’ve of course expressed our concern about the flow of foreign fighters into and out of Syria and Iraq in very clear terms.”
“This is not an issue that’s unique to Greece,” she added, noting that some 2,000 out of 15,000 foreign fighters are believed to be Westerners.
Sources at the Greek Foreign Ministry noted that Greece has no “homegrown Jihadists” and that very few pass through the country.
