Tarkhani Houcine
Tarkhani Houcine (or Houssine), also known as Houcine Jendouba, was born in Jendouba, Tunisia, on the 15th of September 1967. He left Tunisia in 1999, and subsequently lived in Germany and, between 2000 and 2006, in Italy.
His name emerged for the first time in 2002 in connection to the terrorist cell of Faraj Faraj Hassan and reportedly answered to Ben Yahia Mouldi before his arrest in 2001. After Mouldi’s arrest, Tarkhani rose to a prominent role in the terrorist cell in Milan and in the Islamic centre of Viale Jenner, and according to M’Sahel’s statement to the authorities, Tarkhani also headed a group of radical Islamists in Bologna, who were allegedly ready for suicide operations. He went on to become part of the cell led by M’Sahel Mohamed. Of that cell were also part Ghayour Amine, Koutari Bouchaib, and Laredj Ameur.
Tarkhani met M’Sahel in 2002 in the centre of Viale Jenner in Milan, where he ran a small bodega. Viale Jenner was a known hotspot for jihadists and had been since the war in Bosnia.
In M’Sahel’s cell, Tarkhani had been heavily involved both in the forgery of documents – in one particular instance in December 2005 Tarkhani had gone to Cesena to obtain a false passport – and in the enabling of the international movement of jihadist volunteers. In January 2006, M’Sahel was in Morocco to organise the movement of some of these volunteers. M’Sahel then called Tarkhani to ask him for money that was needed to “deliver some goods”. While during the call the two deliberately used cryptic language, the context and other evidence indicated that the “goods” were the above-mentioned volunteers that needed to be moved from Morocco to Iraq. Tarkhani complied with the request.
Knowing of this activity conducted by M’Sahel, in February Tarkhani asked him if he could organise the movement of some Tunisian nationals residing in Bologna who would have been willing to do “martyrdom operations” in the Iraqi theatre. M’Sahel said he would organise it when he was back in Italy, although it is important to note that during his time in Morocco M’Sahel went to Algeria where he met the leaders of the Salafi Group for Preaching and Combat (SGPC); there he offered to “enlist” those Tunisian men for the planned terrorist attacks in Italy and Europe. Tarkhani was initially not made aware of this trip to Algeria by M’Sahel.
This plan never came to fruition as M’Sahel was arrested in Morocco before being able to return to Italy. After the arrest, Tarkhani was advised by another man connected to the cell, called Chibani Mohamed, not to call M’Sahel’s phone as it had probably been put under surveillance by the Moroccan authorities.
On the 30th of March 2006, after Ghayour Amine and Chibani Mohamed had been arrested, Tarkhani asked for help from Dridi Sabri – another important member of the terrorist network active around the area of Milan – to escape to France. The timing had been particularly convenient as on the 1st of April the Ministry of the Interior had ordered his expulsion. Nonetheless, Dridi managed to smuggle Tarkhani out of the centre in Viale Jenner and bring him to France.
In May 2007 he was arrested at the French-German border as an irregular migrant, and held in a detention centre in the French city of Metz, pending the execution of an expulsion order. On June 2007 he was forcibly returned from France to Tunisia, and was detained on arrival in Tunis.
As he was unaware of the more recent arrest warrant of the Public Prosecutor’s Office of Milan in his regards, he came back to Italy around May/June of 2009 on a boat with other migrants; he was soon after arrested by Carabinieri in a reception centre for migrants in Sicily.
According to the latest available information Tarkhani was acquitted by the court of Assize of Milan, in November 2011. He was tried for international terrorism.