on exercise in
Zarqa, Jordan, September 2014 Participation in this operation is through secret services, military forces, and police forces. The main contributors to the sharing effort are the
Iraqi Army, Kurdish forces (
Peshmerga and
YPG),
NATO allies and the members of the international military coalition against the Islamic State group. The force includes officers from
Bahrein,
Egypt,
Jordan,
Saudi Arabia and the
United Arab Emirates working alongside
Australia,
Belgium,
Denmark,
France,
Germany,
Israel,
Italy,
Netherlands,
New Zealand,
Portugal,
Singapore,
Spain,
Sweden, the
United Kingdom, the
United States and others Europol also dispatched analysts to Gallant Phoenix since 16 August 2017. As of 2021 some 30 countries have been sharing intelligence about jihadist terror organizations at a secret site with the aim of facilitating prosecutions, French newspaper
Le Monde reports online. Two military personnel of the
Portuguese Armed Forces (Portuguese: Forças Armadas) are taking part in the operation (2022). Belgian defence sources have confirmed Belgian participation since 2016. Members of the Belgian
General Intelligence and Security Service (GISS)/(ADIV) carry out secret operations abroad using members of the armed forces schooled in intelligence. Belgian military units train Kurdish forces (Peshmerga and YPG) and members of the Iraqi regular army. The Belgian military intelligence agency ADIV under Eddy Testelmans trained at least in two occasions the YPG in northern Irak in exchange of information about Belgian fighters. The ADIV also liaises between OGP and the Belgian authorities. The
Netherlands trains Kurdish militia and is an active contributor to OGP. The
Netherlands Armed Forces,
Royal Marechaussee and
National Police Force have their part in OGP by delivering
data analysts and personnel specialized in investigating and persecution. In a statement of
Trine Bramsen the
Ministry of Defence acknowledged the participation of Denmark since 2018. In Spain information-gathering efforts made by officers on the ground in Syria are relayed to
CITCO, the Intelligence Center for Counter-Terrorism and Organized Crime. This agency answers to the Interior Ministry and receives assistance from the
National Police,
Civil Guard, regional law enforcement agencies and the national intelligence center
CNI. In France, participant since 2017, the first trial in which Gallant Phoenix intel was submitted took place last month before the
Paris special assize court. Called the "
Ulysses affair", the complex dossier was centered around two separate attack plans that were foiled in November 2016, following a cyber infiltration operation in which the French
counterterrorism DGSI agency, together with the
Interministerial Technical Assistance Service (SIAT), managed to make their way into the ISIS headquarters in
Raqqa, Syria. ''"It's simple, if we manage to bring evidence that someone stayed in this zone, the average sentence in France is 12-13 years. If we can prove there was a commitment to join in combat, the sentence can reach more than 20 years,"'' says an expert. ==References==