Danish court convicts teenage girl for terrorism

A Danish court on Tuesday found a teenage girl guilty of terrorism over planning to attack two schools, one of them a Jewish school in the capital, Copenhagen.

The teen, now aged 17, has been in custody since January 2016.

“She converted to Islam a few years ago and was believed to be the first female charged with terrorism in the Scandinavian country,’’ local media reported.

The three judges and six jurors at the Holbaek District Court were unanimous that the girl whose name was withheld under Danish law had planned to target the Carolineskolen, a private Jewish school in Copenhagen.

The other was her former school near her home in Holbaek, north-west of the capital.

She was also convicted of attacking an employee at an institution where she was held on remand.

She would be sentenced on Thursday.

Prosecutor Kristian Kirk welcomed the court’s decision.

The girl and her attorney, Mette Grith Stage, had claimed during the trial that the girl had been “bored” and had never planned to carry out the plans.

The court cited that ingredients to make explosives and notes about possible targets had been found during a search of the girl’s home.

It also cited the messages she sent in late 2015 to a Twitter account she believed was used by a leader of the Islamic State extremist group.