Austrian police said they prevented an attack on the Vienna Pride parade

Police in Austria said they apprehended three people on suspicion of being Islamists who were plotting an assault on the country's annual LGBTQ+ Pride march.

More than 300,000 people showed up on Saturday for the march in the capital city of Vienna.

Young men between the ages of 14 and 20 were arrested in their homes by Austrian authorities on Saturday.

No information was made public, but they did say that knives, an ax, and air guns had been confiscated.

Sunday's arrests were announced at a press briefing by Omar Haijawi-Pirchner, the head of Austria's domestic intelligence.

He added that authorities delayed to announce the attack until after the procession so that people wouldn't be nervous.

The purpose of terrorism is to instill widespread panic, as you say. It is our responsibility to prevent it from happening.

According to Mr. Haijawi-Pirchner, the individuals were Austrian nationals of Bosnian and Chechen heritage, and one of them was already known to authorities due to other terrorism allegations.

He also noted that Austrian officials were aware of calls for future attacks from the so-called Islamic State (IS).

He remarked, "Europol [European police organization] just published a report to that effect, and there are calls to carry out attacks in Europe again." That "we are taking this very seriously"

In November 2020, an IS gunman opened fire in a busy Vienna nightclub, killing four and injured twenty-three. This was the last time IS carried out an attack in Austria.

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