STOCKHOLM (Reuters) -Swedish prosecutors on Thursday charged a Syrian-Swedish dual national captured in an undercover sting operation with planning a suicide bomb attack on a crowded Stockholm culture festival, on behalf of the Islamic State militant group.
The prosecutor said the 18-year-old, who was arrested in February, had been planning to blow himself up at the Stockholm Culture Festival which drew 2 million visitors over the span of five days in August.
Described as a “self-radicalised” young man who had pledged allegiance to Islamic State, he was charged with planning a terrorist crime and being a member of a terrorist organisation. The man denies the charges and was not named by the prosecutor.
“There was a clear will to commit an attack, an attack with the intent to cause as much damage to human life as possible,” prosecutor Carl Mellberg told a news conference.
The man’s lawyer did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
Police used an undercover agent who claimed to be part of a militant Islamist movement and coaxed the man into believing they would carry out the attack together.
The suspect was arrested after he had reconnoitered locations and purchased materials to make a bomb, and bought a body camera to record the attack.
The Islamic State, which imposed hardline Islamist rule over millions of people in Syria and Iraq from 2014-2019, is attempting to stage a comeback after the fall of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
The man was also indicted, along with a 17-year-old boy, for planning to murder a man in a small town in southern Germany last year. They both deny the charges.
(Reporting by Johan Ahlander; editing by Niklas Pollard)
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