SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN, Germany- Three people who were arrested Tuesday morning in Germany are suspected of being members of ISIS and are being investigated in connection with November’s deadly terror attacks in Paris, German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said in Berlin.
An investigation seems to indicate that the same organization of smugglers that brought in the Paris attackers also brought in these three suspects, and their travel documents appear to have originated from the same forger, de Maiziere said.
The three young Syrian nationals claim are members of ISIS.
The German Federal Prosecutor’s Office said in a statement that they apprehended two Syrian teenagers and one man in his 20s, identified as Mohamed A. They were arrested Tuesday morning in the northern state of Schleswig-Holstein by special police forces.
The Prosecutor’s Office says that investigations suspect the three men of coming to Germany on the orders of ISIS in November 2015, to either commit an act of terror or to wait for further instructions. They were charged with being members of a foreign terrorist organization.
One of the accused, a 17-year-old that CNN is not naming, joined ISIS at the end of September 2015 in Raqqa, the terror organization’s de facto capital in Syria. He is suspected of receiving training there, including the handling of weapons and explosives. In October 2015, the three accused pledged to go to Europe, the Prosecutor’s Office alleges.
The three were given passports provided by ISIS and received thousands of US dollars as well as mobile phones. The three came to Germany in the middle of November 2015 via Turkey and Greece, the Office said.
In 2015 and 2016, several European countries have experienced atrocities linked to ISIS-affiliated terrorists and “lone wolf” actors who have pledged fealty to the jihadist group.
Tuesday’s arrests come as European security officials hunt for people connected to those who killed at least 130 people in gunfire and suicide bombings at six locations in the Paris area on November 13.
European security officials had estimated that 30 to 40 suspected ISIS terrorists who helped support the November Paris attacks are still at large, CNN reported last week.
De Maiziere did not say what connection Tuesday’s three arrested suspects may have had with the Paris attacks, other than coming into Europe via the same smuggling group that brought in the Paris attackers.ains a target for terror and the country will suffer new attacks.
“The threat is maximal,” Valls said in an interview with the Europe 1 radio station. “We have seen it again in the past few days, the past few hours, and even as we speak. Every day intelligence services, police and gendarmerie thwart attacks and dismantle Iraqi-Syrian networks.”
