A CIA official has revealed the service helped thwart an ISIS terror attack that was intended to kill ‘tens of thousands’ of fans at Taylor Swift‘s Vienna concert.
Speaking at an Intelligence and National Security Summit in Maryland on Wednesday, CIA Deputy Director David Cohen said the agency provided Austrian authorities with critical information about four people who were connected to the Islamic State and were planning to attack the concert.
‘They were plotting to kill a huge number, tens of thousands of people at this concert, I am sure many Americans,’ Cohen said, reported the New York Times.
The official added that some of the individuals arrested were found with bomb-making materials and had direct access to the venue, where three Eras Tour shows were set to take place.
The shows, which were set to host an audience of 200,000, from August 8 to August 10, at Vienna’s Ernst Happel Stadium were quickly cancelled following the arrests.
On August 7, Austrian authorities arrested two people accused of plotting a terror attack, and others were arrested in following days.
Cohen did not clarify how the CIA had learned about the planned attack but said: ‘I can tell you within my agency and others, there were people who thought that was a really good day for Langley,’ referring to the CIA headquarters, ‘And not just for the Swifties in the workforce.’
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Three people have been arrested in connection with the terror plot, including 19-year-old Austrian ISIS fanatic, Beran A, who had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State and set his sights on Swift’s tour as a target.
He is currently considered to be the main suspect.
The other arrested suspects are a 17-year-old Austrian and an 18-year-old Iraqi – but their names have not yet been released.
Beran A. was revealed to have been building a bomb in his parent’s back garden and earlier this month it was reported the teen was radicalized by notorious hate-preacher Abul Baraa in Berlin, according to German intelligence sources.
