Minnesota man pleads guilty to conspiring with IS

WASHINGTON, Feb 11 (KUNA) -- A man from Egan, Minnesota, pleaded guilty on Thursday to charges of conspiring to provide material support to the so-called Islamic State (IS or ISIL) by traveling to Syria to join the terrorist group, the Justice Department announced.
Abdirizak Mohamed Warsame, 20, participated in a series of meetings with co-conspirators where they discussed funding and potential routes from Minnesota to Syria. Warsame applied for an expedited passport with the intent to travel overseas that same month. He accepted the position of "emir" of the group as the previous one planned to leave to join IS.
Warsame later obtained a phone number for an an IS fighter identified as H.K and passed the information to Y.J. who was attempting to travel from to Turkey to Syria.
His guilty plea states that he participated in other meetings with co-conspirators where one of the encouraged him to travel to Syria to also join.
"ISIL recruiting in Minnesota is an ongoing problem," said US Attorney Andrew Luger in the Justice statement.
The case is the result of an investigation conducted by the FBI. (end) ak.gb