America
Youth accused of helping man join IS, arrested
Washington, March 5
A US high school student,
who allegedly helped a man travel to Syria to join the Islamic State
(IS) terrorist group, has been arrested, according to media reports.
The
US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) raided the house of the
accused teenager, a student of Osbourn Park High School in the US state
of Virginia, and arrested him, the Washington Post reported on
Wednesday.
The teenager, however, was charged only as a juvenile,
though federal prosecutors were navigating the legal process needed to
move the case to an adult court, an official said.
Many details
of the investigation remain unclear, but the case seems to be yet
another instance of a youth living in the US and using the internet to
offer tangible help to the IS.
Officials said that the teenager
helped a man, not too older than himself, to travel to Syria, in part,
by using online contacts that led to the IS overseas.
According
to experts, such instances could become increasingly common as youths,
inspired by terrorist posts and videos online, could now reach out and
forge overseas connections.
“Social media has really been a
gamechanger,†said Matthew Levitt, director of the Stein Programme on
Counter-terrorism and Intelligence at the Washington Institute for Near
East Policy.
According to neighbours of the accused youth, and a
man who hired the teenager to write for his website, the Osbourn Park
student was quiet in nature, but exceptionally intelligent, authoring
articles on complicated science and technology topics.
Dustin
O'Bryant, who employed the teen to write for his digital currency news
website, said the boy was a “great writer†who “had a really strong
understanding of the technology behind digital currency in general, and
even more advanced systemsâ€.
O'Bryant said he hired the teenager
on the spot after reading a chemistry research paper the boy wrote. “He
was a brilliant kid.â€
Researchers from the International Centre
for the Study of Radicalisation and Political Violence have estimated
that more than 20,000 foreign fighters have joined the IS, a fifth of
them from western Europe.
Director of National Intelligence in
the US, James Clapper, said on Monday that about 180 Americans have gone
or tried to go to Syria since the conflict there began and about 40
have returned, although those who came back did not have nefarious
motives for their travel.