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U.S. teen indicted for trying to join Islamic State

Xinhua, February 20, 2015 Adjust font size:

A 19-year-old American from the state of Minnesota has been indicted for trying to join the militant group Islamic State (IS), local media reported Thursday.

Hamza Ahmed has been indicted by a federal grad jury on two counts of conspiring to and attempting to provide material support to the IS, according to the court documents cited by the reports.

Ahmed, who traveled with three other young men from Minneapolis to New York, was stopped on Nov. 9 by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) from flying to Turkey en route to Syria. Turkey has been used by many foreign fighters as a stop to continue their trip to join the IS in the war-torn Syria.

IS has taken over vast swaths of territory in Iraq and Syria and brutally beheaded scores of civilians, including American, British and Japanese journalists and aid workers. The U.S. is leading an international alliance which has launched a bombing campaign aimed at destroying the militants, as Washington fears the conquered areas could be used as staging grounds for a strike on the U.S.

Ahmed has been charged previously with repeatedly trying to lie to the federal agents investigating the IS recruitment of young Americans residents. Endite