three young people arrested in Switzerland

Three young people, including two minors, were recently arrested in Switzerland due to possible plans for explosive attacks, cases linked to investigations in Germany, the Swiss federal prosecutor’s office said on Saturday April 13. On Friday, German justice announced that four minors suspected of preparing an attack “Islamist motivated” in Germany had been arrested over the Easter weekend and placed in pre-trial detention.

In Switzerland, two young people, a 15-year-old Swiss and a 16-year-old Italian, are “in preventive detention since the Easter weekend” after being arrested in the canton of Schaffhausen (north), the local prosecutor’s office said on Saturday. They were arrested because of “suspicions of participation in or support for a terrorist organization”in this case the jihadist organization Islamic State, and “preparatory acts with a view to intentional homicide”, according to the same source. The investigation focuses in particular on “possible plans for explosive attacks”added the prosecution.

“There are links between the Swiss investigations and the investigations carried out in Germany, about which the public prosecutor’s office in Düsseldorf (Germany) communicated on April 12”the Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office (MPC) told the media.

The MPC indicated that a third person, an 18-year-old Swiss man, had been arrested for the same reasons in the canton of Thurgau (north). However, the date of his arrest was not specified. “According to the current state of knowledge, the two minor defendants from the canton of Schaffhausen were in contact with the 18-year-old defendant”, indicated the federal prosecutor’s office. The MPC is in contact with the German authorities, in particular to “clarify intentions and roles” of the various people arrested.