What foiled Taylor Swift concert attack plot says about Daesh threat to Europe

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Police in Ternitz have arrested a 19-year-old Austrian man of Macedonian descent, right, thought to be the mastermind behind a plot to attack fans of US superstar Taylor Swift, bottom left, at the Ernst Happel Stadium in Vienna, top left, in echoes of earlier attacks on European concert venues, below. Despite its territorial defeat in Iraq and Syria, Daesh continues to pose a security threat. (AFP)
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Updated 19 August 2024
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What foiled Taylor Swift concert attack plot says about Daesh threat to Europe

  • Three young men were arrested by Austrian police on Aug. 7 for allegedly planning to target event in Vienna’s Ernst Happel Stadium
  • The plot, which echoed earlier attacks on European concert venues, showed the allure Daesh still holds for alienated youths

ATHENS: Taylor Swift fans were left disappointed earlier this month by news that the American pop star’s long-awaited tour dates in the Austrian capital, Vienna, were to be canceled owing to a terrorist threat to the concert venue by Daesh sympathizers.

On Aug. 7, Austrian authorities arrested three youths, aged 19, 17 and 15, who they claimed were involved in, or had knowledge of, a terrorist plot to attack the Ernst Happel Stadium where Swift was due to perform over the Aug. 8-10 period.




A closer view of the Austrian man of Macedonian descent, identified only as Beran A., who was arrested by Austrian police for allegedly plotting a terror attack on a stadium where American singer Taylor Swift was to hold a concert last week. (Social media photo 

After searching the home of the 19-year-old suspect, an Austrian national with North Macedonian heritage, police found an array of edged weapons and bomb-making materials, counterfeit cash and Daesh propaganda.

Although the suspects had been taken into police custody, Swift’s promoter Barracuda Music decided to cancel the superstar’s three-date run of her Eras Tour, which was expected to attract 65,000 fans inside the stadium at each concert and 30,000 onlookers outside.




Merchandising booths for items related to US mega-star Taylor Swift are closed next to the Ernst-Happel Stadium in Vienna, Austrian, on August 8, 2024, after her three concerts were cancelled following after the arrest of a Daesh sympathiser in connection with an attack plot. (AFP)

The decision was deemed prudent, especially given Daesh’s track record of attacking European concert venues. The group killed 90 at the Bataclan theater in Paris, France, in 2015. Two years later, a Daesh suicide bomber killed 22 at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, England.

Most recently, in March of this year, a massive, coordinated attack on Moscow’s Crocus City Hall by Daesh’s Central Asian branch, Islamic State in Khorasan, or IS-K, killed 145 people and injured more than 500.

What is surprising about the Vienna plot, however, is Daesh’s ability to continue recruiting followers in Western nations — long after its territorial defeat in Iraq and Syria in 2019 and despite international efforts to smash its leadership, financing networks and online presence.

“I’m not so surprised that there are still young people who join Daesh and want to do something in Europe,” Thomas Schmidinger, a Vienna-based political scientist and expert in extremism and deradicalization, told Arab News.

“I think the failure of Daesh as a state project in Iraq and Syria may have even increased the danger of terrorist attacks in Europe, because, in 2014 and 2015, people were going to Syria to join Daesh there. Now there is no more existing state project, but the organization continues to exist. The reasons why young people were attracted by this ideology are still here.”




An image grab taken from a propaganda video released on March 17, 2014 by the Daesh's al-Furqan Media shows the group's fighters driving on a street in the northern Syrian City of Homs. (AFP)

Schmidinger, however, believes it may have been a mistake to cancel Swift’s Vienna tour dates as doing so might encourage Daesh to threaten other such events in the future.

“The way the organizers of the concert reacted was actually a victory for the terrorists, because the Austrian police did catch the possible perpetrators and there was no reason to cancel the event,” he said. “This cancelation is now at least a propaganda victory for Daesh.”

Although authorities are desperate to avoid a repeat of the attacks in Paris, Manchester and Moscow, analysts say coordinated attacks of this scale are likely to be rare. Indeed, the majority of Daesh-inspired activities in the West, particularly in recent years, can be attributed to self-radicalized individuals acting of their own accord.




This handout photograph taken and released by Russian Emergency Ministry on March 23, 2024 shows 
rescuers working inside the Crocus City Hall, a day after a gun attack in Krasnogorsk, outside Moscow. (Handout via AFP/File)

“You can tell the difference between someone who was inspired by Daesh, or just said they were Daesh, versus the ones who actually were Daesh,” Mia Bloom, professor of communication and Middle East studies at Georgia State University, told Arab News.

“There are degrees to which people claim Daesh affiliation and loyalty. They make this baya, or pledge of allegiance, to Daesh, but this doesn’t necessarily mean that Daesh has accepted it.

“For example, you can have people who are radicalized online who engage in a violent attack and they say they were inspired by watching beheading videos or propaganda that they’ve consumed.

“That’s very different from what we saw at the Bataclan in France, or in Charlie Hebdo, or in Dhaka, Bangladesh, where the perpetrators were trained in a Daesh camp. Daesh funded it, and Daesh live-streamed it on GoPro cameras.”




Rescuers carry a survivor of the Paris terrorist attack on the Bataclan theater on November 13, 2016. (Corbis via Getty Images/File)

Europe is not alone in facing an ongoing threat from Daesh. Although attacks in the US have been less common, the perpetrators of the 2015 shooting in San Bernardino, California, which left 16 dead, had pledged allegiance to Daesh on Facebook. A year later, a shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida, claimed 49 lives.

However, there was no evidence that Daesh planned either attack.

“Daesh put out infographics on their successes from around 2014 to 2019,” said Bloom. “They put out a map of the US showing the attacks for which they were responsible, and they put Orlando in California and San Bernardino in Florida.

“If you don’t even know where the attack was, you probably weren’t responsible for it.” 

INNUMBERS

• 28 Completed, failed or foiled terrorist attacks recorded in the EU in 2022.

• 380 People arrested by EU member states for terrorism-related offenses in 2022.

Source: Europol

Just last week, two Somali refugees living in Arizona pleaded guilty to attempting to join Daesh. The men, who were arrested in 2019, had allegedly made plans to travel to Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, with one stating his wish to martyr himself and to become “the beheading guy.”

A June report by NBC highlighted the Department of Homeland Security’s identification of 400 Central Asian immigrants who may have been brought to the US by a Daesh-affiliated human smuggling network.

Though some of these individuals have been found, the department claims the whereabouts of at least 50 are still unknown.




US Customs and Border Patrol agents load migrants into a vehicle after groups of migrants walked into the US from Mexico at Jacumba Hot Springs, California, on June 5, 2024. The Department of Homeland Security are on the lookout for possible Daesh terrorists being smuggled into the US. (AFP/File) 

“Particularly through illegal immigration routes, that means most of the southern border, there has been an influx of people who have some degree of connection to Daesh,” Lorenzo Vidino, director of George Washington University’s Program on Extremism, told Arab News.

“This doesn’t mean that everybody smuggled in was Daesh, but nonetheless, the smuggling network had a Daesh connection, and so some individuals who have been arrested in the US have come through those routes and have known Daesh links.”

While Daesh may be able to infiltrate Western countries from overseas, Vidino says the number of native-born, self-radicalized individuals is likely to be far higher.

“If you look historically at the attacks that we’ve seen in the US over the last 10 years, most of them were perpetrated by Americans, not those who were smuggled through the southern border,” he said.




In this Daesh publicity image in 2015, a masked militant poses holding the terrorist group's banner somewhere in the deserts of Iraq or Syria. (Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

More than five years since Daesh’s defeat in its last territorial holdout of Baghouz in eastern Syria, many wonder what is drawing new recruits to the group. According to Schmidinger, there is rarely a single reason.

“The biographies of young men who join Daesh are very diverse,” he said.

“These are people who went through strong alienation from their societies. The reasons for this alienation are different. It can be psychological problems, it can be related to racism and anti-Muslim sentiment in Europe, it can be related to the failure of their educational or professional careers. It can be related to problems with their sexual orientation.

“There are different concrete reasons. But what they have in common is this alienation from European societies.”




(Source: The Soufan Group, 2014 and 2015/via European Parliamentary Research Service)

He added: “Daesh was here at the moment that they were searching for meaning, belonging and the ability to intervene in history. So you have a lot of people who feel powerless. They have the feeling that by perpetrating, for example, a terrorist attack, or by threatening European societies, they get power. They become masters of their own history.

“Especially for people who feel completely alienated and powerless, this is an attractive opportunity that gives them a kind of empowerment. I think one of the big problems for these people is that there is no other radical but humanistic alternative for them.”

Although Daesh and other extremist entities continue to pose a threat to Western states, there are ways to undermine their attack potential by eliminating their safe havens in the world’s ungoverned and unstable spaces.

Tens of thousands of Daesh-linked individuals are held in prisons and camps across northeast Syria, guarded by the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF. However, these facilities have witnessed frequent violence and escape attempts.




Syrian Kurdish soldiers guard the al-Hol camp in Syria's northeastern Hasakeh governorate, which holds relatives of suspected Daesh fighters. (AFP/File)

Sympathizers in Europe have even organized fundraising campaigns to help Daesh-affiliated women held in these camps to support themselves and even to smuggle themselves out.

Siyamend Ali, a spokesperson for the Kurdish-led People’s Protection Units — a group affiliated with the SDF — told Arab News there are areas of northern Syria where Daesh and other extremist groups “can continue to train, gather resources, issue orders and propagandize.”

Tensions in northeast Syria between the SDF, Syrian regime forces and the Turkish military are also having a destabilizing effect, said Ali, increasing the likelihood of a Daesh resurgence in the region.

In addition to eliminating Daesh’s international networks and safe havens, Schmidinger says that the threat of future attacks in Europe can also be reduced through the implementation of social policies to promote integration and inclusion.




In this photo taken on July 21, 2014, British women wait to attend a gathering in London of the "Families Against Stress and Trauma," which was formed to dissuade young people from traveling to Syria and Iraq to join the Daesh group. (Getty Images)

“You will never be able to completely stop it. We will always face some people on the fringes of society who will be attracted to extremist organizations like Daesh,” he said.

“But it is possible to reduce the number by reducing the feeling of alienation from society. By giving all people the chance for education, a proper job, and to give people — especially young people — the chance to participate in society and politics, it will keep them from feeling that they are powerless and can’t change anything.

“They won’t need an extremist organization to give them the feeling that they can change things in society.”
 

 


Senegalese lawmakers weigh corruption cases against former ministers

Updated 14 sec ago
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Senegalese lawmakers weigh corruption cases against former ministers

DAKAR: Senegalese lawmakers on Thursday began debating whether to allow several former ministers to face charges before a special court over accusations they embezzled funds meant for the country’s fight against COVID-19.

Senegal’s National Assembly is controlled mainly by President Bassirou Diomaye Faye’s party, elected in March last year on a promise to change how the West African country is run compared to his predecessors.

Faye has made the fight against corruption a policy priority and has launched investigations into the administration of Macky Sall, president from 2012 for 12 years.

But the opposition has slammed the moves as a “witch hunt.”

Last Friday, lawmakers lifted parliamentary immunity from prosecution for two opposition MPs caught up in the allegations while serving in Sall’s administration.

Proceedings of this type are rare in Senegal, and lawmakers must authorize cases against former ministers in the exercise of their duties.

Moustapha Diop was the industrial development minister while Salimata Diop was the women’s affairs minister under Sall when the fund to fight the spread of Covid-19 was established in 2020-21.

Both have rejected accusations that they misappropriated any of the money, totaling one trillion CFA francs ($1.7 billion).

The funds were intended to reinforce the health care system, support households and the private sector, and protect jobs during the pandemic.

However, a December 2022 Court of Auditors report revealed irregularities, such as 2.7 billion CFA francs in over-invoicing of rice purchased for disadvantaged households and some 42 million CFA francs for sanitiser.

Three other former ministers accused are Amadou Mansour Faye, the former president’s brother-in-law, Aissatou Sophie Gladima, and Ismaila Madior Fall.

Several prominent figures, including artists, broadcasters, fashion designers, and senior officials, have been questioned during an investigation.

Parliament lifted immunity for Moustapha Diop and Salimata Diop last Friday as they were elected lawmakers in November after Sall left office.

A three-fifths majority of the 165 lawmakers is required to adopt each draft resolution, with voting by secret ballot.

The High Court’s investigative committee could then question the accused, who will decide whether or not to commit them for trial.

The court’s final decision is not subject to appeal.


Albania votes in election test for EU accession

Updated 21 min 54 sec ago
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Albania votes in election test for EU accession

  • Vote — a first of its kind, as Albanians abroad can take part — pits outgoing Prime Minister Edi Rama against his arch-rival Sali Berisha
  • Doors to Brussels, he says, are the key to ‘being able to give Albanians a European passport’ and allowing them to ‘benefit from the same rights as citizens of all other European countries’

TIRANA: Albanians go to the polls on Sunday for legislative elections seen as crucial to gauge the country’s democratic development and determine its widely held goal of a European future.
The vote — a first of its kind, as Albanians abroad can take part — pits outgoing Prime Minister Edi Rama against his arch-rival Sali Berisha, a right-winger who heads an alliance of opposition parties.
Rama, 60, has been Socialist Party leader since 2005 and is seeking an unprecedented fourth consecutive term on a promise of European Union membership by 2030.
The doors to Brussels, he says, are the key to “being able to give Albanians a European passport” and allowing them to “benefit from the same rights as citizens of all other European countries.”

Trying to stop Rama is Berisha, 80, who is eager to return to power after 12 years in opposition.
The former president heads an opposition coalition that has adopted a Donald Trump-like slogan, “Great Albania,” based on economic revival.
“We are the only ones who can relaunch the country’s economy, the only ones able to take Albania forward. Edi Rama is counting the last days of his regime,” said Berisha.
The campaign also gives him a chance to reburnish his image as a strong leader, despite being under the spotlight of Albanian justice, where he is suspected of being implicated in a corruption case that allegedly benefited his family.

Shortly before the end of a campaign marked by verbal excesses, particularly on social media, the latest polls indicated a win for Rama’s party.
The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe meanwhile said there was “extreme political polarization” in the Balkan nation of 2.8 million.
Berisha accuses the socialists of “vote-buying, voter intimidation, pressure, use of public funds by ministers and majority candidates for their election campaign.”
Rama has dismissed the claims as “nothing but an excuse for defeat.”

For the first time in the history of elections in Albania, the diaspora is able to vote from abroad by post, in a test for the development of democratic processes and institutions, especially in the context of EU accession negotiations, which began in 2022.
According to official data from the central electoral commission, 245,935 Albanians not resident in Albania are registered to vote.
“Albania has made significant process on the path to EU accession, demonstrating its perseverance in implementing ambitious reforms for the benefit of its citizens,” Silvio Gonzato, the EU delegation’s ambassador in Albania, told AFP.

The losers have challenged the results of every election since the end of communism at the start of the 1990s on the grounds of fraud.
But this time round the vote is being closely watched and in another first, civil servants and justice officials will be deployed alongside the electoral commission and some 300 international observers.
The special prosecutor against corruption and organized crime has meanwhile just opened a verification procedure over a $6-million contract signed in April between an Albanian-American community foundation in the United States and the US lobbying firm Continental Strategy.
Continental Strategy was founded by Carlos Trujillo, a top adviser to Trump.
“The contract aims to strengthen relations between the United States and the Democratic Party, the main opposition force,” according to the party.

For Brussels, Sunday’s vote is a major new test for Albania, which has been a member of NATO since 2009.
“The organization of free and fair elections, in line with democratic norms and democratic values, will be an essential step to reinforce Albanian democracy, boost citizens’ trust in their elected representatives and advance the country’s European integration,” said Gonzato.
Just five days after the elections, Tirana will be the venue for the next European Political Community summit.


Portugal police arrest crime ring over fraudulent permits for 10,000 foreigners

Updated 08 May 2025
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Portugal police arrest crime ring over fraudulent permits for 10,000 foreigners

  • The foreigners paid to obtain bogus labor contracts that allowed them to stay in the
  • Portugal’s center-right government has toughened some immigration rules in the past year

LISBON: Portuguese police have arrested 13 people they believe provided an estimated more than 10,000 foreigners with residence permits and documents allowing them to stay in Portugal and the European Union in exchange for bribes, police said on Thursday.
A spokesperson for the Judicial Police force said the bribes paid to the group, which included a foreign ministry employee, a lawyer and several entrepreneurs, averaged 15,000 euros ($16,950) per person.
The foreigners paid to obtain bogus labor contracts that allowed them to stay in the country and then get residence permits, open bank accounts and access the social security system. Many of them have since left for other EU member states, police said.
Portugal’s center-right government has toughened some immigration rules in the past year, reflecting attempts elsewhere in Europe to fend off the rise of the far-right, and on Saturday vowed to deport 18,000 illegal migrants in the coming months.
It was not immediately clear if those who benefited from the illegal scheme counted among those.
Still, the country remains relatively open to migrants, particularly from Portuguese-speaking countries in Africa and from Brazil. Many experts argue that growing immigration has stoked economic growth.
While anti-immigration sentiment is expected to play a role in an early election on May 18, far-right party Chega has been steady or declining in opinion polls after a surge in the previous election last year. The center-right Democratic Alliance of Prime Minister Luis Montenegro looks set to win the most votes.


IMF says Nigeria repays $3.4 billion COVID-19 funding

Updated 08 May 2025
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IMF says Nigeria repays $3.4 billion COVID-19 funding

  • In April 2020, the IMF provided the financing to help Nigeria
  • “Nigeria is expected to honor some additional payments,” Ebeke added

LAGOS: Nigeria has repaid $3.4 billion in emergency funding it received from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to help the country cope with the impact of the coronavirus pandemic five years ago, the global lender said on Thursday.
In April 2020, the IMF provided the financing to help Africa’s largest oil exporter cope with a collapse in crude prices, which hit its finances and tipped the economy into recession.
IMF resident representative to Nigeria Christian Ebeke said in a statement that, as of April 30, the country had “fully repaid the financial support” it received under the Fund’s Rapid Financing Instrument, a facility that provides urgent balance of payments funding to member nations.
“Nigeria is expected to honor some additional payments in the form of Special Drawing Rights charges of about $30 million annually,” Ebeke added.
The most recent data from the Debt Management Office shows that Nigeria last year spent $4.66 billion to service its foreign debt, of which $1.63 billion was to the IMF.


Greenpeace Denmark launches fake tourism ad to highlight pollution

Updated 08 May 2025
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Greenpeace Denmark launches fake tourism ad to highlight pollution

  • “We are inviting Europeans to discover the wonders of Denmark’s agricultural landscape,” Fromberg told
  • Greenpeace believes that Denmark has repeatedly violated the EU Water Framework Directive

COPENHAGEN: Discover a dying sea or cycle through protected natural areas covered in asphalt? A tourism campaign by Greenpeace’s Danish branch seeks to highlight environmental pollution in the Nordic country.
“Through the campaign, which is available on social networks as well as on billboards in Brussels and Warsaw, we are inviting Europeans to discover the wonders of Denmark’s agricultural landscape,” Christian Fromberg, head of agriculture and nature at Greenpeace Denmark, told AFP Thursday.
With a tone of sarcasm Fromberg went on to describe the sights: “Here we find asphyxiated seas littered with mysterious brown sludge, car parks and golf courses that are in officially protected natural areas.”
In the Scandinavian country, which prides itself on being a leader in the combating climate change, human activities, particularly waste from agriculture, have suffocated marine ecosystems.
The equivalent of 7,500 square kilometers (2,896 square miles) of the waters around the country, or 17 percent of the surface area of mainland Denmark, has been affected by deoxygenation, leading to the disappearance of marine flora and fauna, according to the Danish Environmental Protection Agency.
“The campaign is a cry for help to the European Union to enforce the environmental regulations systematically violated by the Danish government,” Fromberg said.
Greenpeace believes that Denmark, which takes over the presidency of the European Union in July, has repeatedly violated the EU Water Framework Directive, which requires member states to implement measures to ensure healthy aquatic ecosystems.
“The current government will not take the necessary measures to revitalize our seas and protect our environment,” Fromberg said.
At the same time, a broad majority of Danish politicians have agreed to introduce a carbon tax on livestock farming by 2030.
Denmark has also committed to make agriculture greener, aiming to reduce nitrogen emissions by 13,780 tons a year by 2027.