Prosecutors drop charges against Iraqi twins accused of planning Supo attack

Prosecutors will not charge two Iraqi twin brothers suspected of planning an attack against Finland’s Security and Intelligence Service, Supo, Yle reports.

The men were suspected of preparing an aggravated crime against life or health in Helsinki in August 2023.

According to prosecutors, the brothers were found filming Supo’s premises. They behaved threateningly when detained, and one said he had killed several people and intended to kill several more in Finland.

After being released from police custody, the other man returned to a police building and shouted that he was Isis in Finland and intended to kill people.

The Southern Finland prosecution district did not bring charges over the alleged attack because there were no probable grounds supporting the brothers’ guilt. The pre-trial investigation found no evidence that either man had agreed to commit a crime or made a detailed plan. It also found no evidence that they had hired, ordered or incited anyone else to commit a crime.

One brother has instead been charged with three counts of violently resisting a public official and five counts of unlawful threats. The other faces three counts of violently resisting a public official and one count of making an unlawful threat.

Previously accused of taking part in massacre

The brothers, who are now 34, were previously charged with murders committed for terrorist purposes.

The Pirkanmaa District Court rejected charges in spring 2017 alleging that the brothers had taken part in a massacre carried out by the extremist organisation Isis in Tikrit, Iraq, in 2014. The Turku Court of Appeal upheld the decision in February 2020.

Both men denied involvement in the massacre. The State Treasury paid each of them more than 213,000 euros in compensation for the suffering caused by their deprivation of liberty, at a rate of 400 euros per day.