Five terror arrests follow police raids in Cardiff and Barry

Two of the arrested men have been named as Rofi Islam and Sajid Idris

Five men have been arrested under the Terrorism Act following raids in Cardiff and Barry.

Officers from North East Counter Terrorism Unit and the Wales Extremism and Counter Terrorism Unit executed six search warrants on Thursday.

The men, aged 19-32, were arrested under section 12 of the act, creating offences in relation to the support of proscribed organisations.

Two of the men have been named as Rofi Islam and Sajid Idris.

The arrests are not linked to two men charged with offences on Wednesday.

Police said the arrests were linked to the Grangetown area of Cardiff and were part of a wider counter-terrorism investigation in Wales, but are not linked to brothers Aseel and Nasser Muthana who went to fight with IS in Syria.

South Wales Police Assistant Chief Constable Nikki Holland denied Cardiff was a hotbed of terrorism.

She said the Muthana brothers and Reyaad Khan had become poster boys in the UK for IS but said police were determined to tackle radicalisation.

"The scale of counter terrorism in Wales is minimal compared to other parts of the UK," she added.

Ramesh Rupaliyah, who works in a shop in Kent Street in Grangetown, said there were a number of police vehicles there at 07:00 GMT when the store opened.

"Police were already there when I got here," he said "there were police vehicles in the street."