Two Danish brothers originally from Somalia busted on suspicion of plotting terror attack

COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) – Two Danish brothers originally from Somalia were arrested  on suspicion of plotting a terror attack, Denmark’s security service said  Tuesday. The two brothers, ages 18 and 23, were arrested late Monday — one in the western city of Aarhus and the other as he arrived by plane at  Copenhagen’s international airport, said the Danish Security and Intelligence  Service, or PET.

The men were suspected of “being in the process of  preparing an act of terror” after they were overheard talking about methods,  targets and different weapons types, PET said in a statement, suggesting the  suspects had been under surveillance. One of them had been to a training camp in  Somalia run by the Islamist militant group al-Shabab, the agency said. The  Somalia-based al-Shabab has links to al-Qaida.

The suspects are “Danish  citizens of Somali origin” who have lived in Denmark for 16 years, PET  said.
“According to PET’s assessment the arrests have prevented a  concrete act of terror, and the arrests therefore don’t lead to a changed  evaluation of the terror threat in Denmark,” PET said, adding that the terror  threat level in Denmark remains “serious.”

The Scandinavian country has  been in the crosshairs of Islamist terror groups after the publication of  newspaper cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad in 2005. A Somali man  living in Denmark was convicted of terrorism and sentenced to 10 years in prison  after breaking into the home of one of the cartoonists with an ax in  2010. Last year, a Chechen-born man was sentenced to 12 years in prison  for preparing a letter bomb that exploded as he was assembling it in a  Copenhagen hotel in 2010.

Another trial is under way in Denmark against  four men accused of plotting a shooting spree at another Danish newspaper.