French police detain Idriss Sihamedi over social media ‘harassment’

Controversial figure is a critic of French President Emmanuel Macron’s plan to crack down on ‘Islamist separatism’

French President Emmanuel Macron wants to change laws to limit the extremist threat in France. Reuters

French police have arrested a prominent Islamist critic of President Emmanuel Macron’s plans for tougher laws to defend the country against foreign-backed extremists.

Idriss Sihamedi, who sparked outrage in 2016 for refusing to condemn ISIS on a French television programme, was arrested early on Wednesday and accused of harassing critics on Twitter.

Officers raided the home of Mr Sihamedi, who was taken to a police station in the southern suburbs of France for questioning.

His lawyer, Samim Bolaky, claims that he was the target of police violence and posted pictures on Twitter of red marks on Mr Sihamedi’s wrists where he was cuffed.

The Muslim NGO he headed, BarakaCity, published pictures of his damaged property in the aftermath of the search. The organisation’s base has been raided on two previous occasions but no criminal charges followed.

The latest arrest follows a complaint by two women, a radio presenter and a former Charlie Hebdo journalist, that they were targeted on social media by Mr Sihamedi, according to French media. He was also accused of photographing mail taken from one of the women's post boxes.

He is being questioned for harassment through digital communications, which carries a prison term of up to five years, Le Parisien reported.

Mr Sihamedi, who has more than 34,000 followers on Twitter, has sought to drum up opposition to Mr Macron’s proposals to prevent Islamic “separatism” in France.

Mr Macron warned earlier this month that the country’s estimated six million Muslims were in danger of forming a counter-society. He called for a crackdown on home schooling, greater controls over foreign funding of mosques and tighter restrictions on groups.

Mr Sihamedi is best known in France for his failure to condemn ISIS when he appeared on a television programme to call for the release of a member of his organisation from custody in Bangladesh, where he had been working with Rohingya refugees.

He appeared alongside the French education minister at the time, Najat Vallaud-Belkacem, who faced criticism for failing to sufficiently condemn Mr Sihamedi’s comments.

Mr Sihamedi later claimed that he made the comments to ensure he did not endanger the work of BarakaCity teams in Syria.

He was also criticised for the decision by France to grant asylum to Asia Bibi, the Christian woman who spent eight years on death row in Pakistan on blasphemy charges.

Mr Sihamedi has since repeatedly sparred with French political leaders and last month announced plans to sue Gerald Darmanin, the French interior minister, for defamation over comments made on Twitter.