Germany has filed charges of supporting an Islamic terrorist organization against a Syrian teenager for allegedly helping design a prevented attack targeting a concert of Taylor Swift last year in Vienna, the attorney general said in a statement today.
The suspect, named as Mohammed A., helped the would-be attacker by translating instructions for making a bomb from Arabic and putting him in touch with an Islamic State member online, according to the charges against him.
Police made several arrests in connection with a plot to attack a concert by Taylor Swift at the Austrian capital’s Ernst Happel stadium, leading to the cancellation of all three of her performances there last year.
“Mohammed A. embraced the ideology of the Islamic State terrorist organisation no later than April 2024,” according to the statement. “From mid-July to August 2024, he was in contact with a young Austrian man who was planning a bomb attack at a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna,” it added.
Earlier this month Austria’s coalition government agreed to a plan that would allow police to monitor suspects’ text messages to prevent armed attacks.
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