Moroccan authorities on Tuesday said they had broken up a recruitment cell for al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb in the central Fez region, after announcing the discovery of a jihadist network last month. "The police, in co-ordination with the leadership of territorial surveillance, have dismantled a cell with six members, originating from the city of Fez," the interior ministry said in a statement.

The aim of the cell was to "enroll and recruit young Moroccans who have embraced jihadist ideas, in order to send them to camps of al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQMI) in Algeria," it added.

Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2012