The investigation is continuing and authorities believe that attacks were being planned, spokesman for the Bonn prosecutor's office, Fred Apostel, told AFP news agency. On Sept.
26, police stormed a Dutch airlines plane at the Cologne-Bonn airport just minutes before it left for Amsterdam. Prosecutors said the two men were planning an "imminent attack."
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Suspicions remain, but evidence lacking But the investigation since the arrests has floundered. Apostel said the evidence was not strong enough to justify charges against the men, who were both living in western Germany.
"After reviewing documents we could no longer maintain a strong suspicion against them," he said, adding that an attack was mentioned in the documents but not in a sufficiently specific way that they could be further detained.
According to an article in
Spiegel magazine, the two men belong to a group of suspected young fanatics who live in the Bonn region. Authorities had been monitoring group members for some time before the arrests, according to the article.
Unlike Britain and Spain, Germany has not suffered a serious recent attack on its soil.
Last year, German officials arrested three people in the western Sauerland region whom authorities believed were planning attacks against US installations in Germany.
(Deutsche Welle)
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