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Jordan court charges 21 with 'terrorism': State media

Jordanian authorities said in March that they had foiled a plot by the Islamic State group to launch attacks in the north of the kingdom
Jordan's King Abdullah II praying with Jordanian army soldiers during the holy month of Ramadan (AFP)

A Jordanian court on Sunday charged 21 people with carrying out "terrorist acts" after their arrest in an operation against militants in the country's north in March, a prosecutor said.

The State Security Court accused them of committing "terrorist acts that led to deaths," making explosives and possessing weapons, the official Petra news agency quoted the court's chief prosecutor as saying. 

The agency did not say when their trial would begin.

In March, Jordan announced it had foiled a plot by the Islamic State (IS) group to carry out attacks in the kingdom in an operation in the city of Irbid.

IS had being planning to target "civilian and military sites," the authorities said, adding seven militants were killed and around 20 arrested in the operation.

Two deadly attacks targeting security forces rocked the kingdom this month.

On Tuesday, a suicide bomber killed seven soldiers in an area where thousands of Syrian refugees are stranded near the Syrian border. 

The bombing came two weeks after a gunman, who was later arrested, killed five Jordanian intelligence officers in a Palestinian refugee camp north of the capital.

Jordan is part of the US-led coalition fighting IS in Syria and Iraq.

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