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A silver propeller plane carrying an alleged suspect touched down at Buttonville Municipal Airport at 3:20 p.m. on Monday. Two uniformed RCMP officers emerged, followed by two other men carrying laptop bags. The accused appeared accompanied by another officer. He was in handcuffs and shackles, blue jeans and sneakers, and wearing a windbreaker. He did not respond to reporters’ shouted questions.

One of the men carrying laptops also declined to talk, walking past without saying a word.

The suspect was bundled into a black Chevy Suburban with tinted windows and whisked from the tarmac.

The arrests come at a time of heightened public concern over terrorism following the bombings in Boston as well as recent revelations over the involvement of radicalized Canadian youths in overseas terrorist groups.

Last week, the RCMP said it was looking into whether a Canadian, Mahad Dhore, had died while taking part in a suicide attack on the courts in the Somali capital Mogadshu. The York University student left Toronto in 2009 and allegedly joined the armed Islamist group Al Shabab.

The RCMP has also been investigating two young classmates from London, Ont., who died in Algeria in January while apparently taking part in a terrorist attack at a gas plant. A third member of the circle is imprisoned in Mauritania on charges he had been recruited to fight with Al Qaeda in Mali.

Testifying last month before a Parliamentary committee, a Canadian Security Intelligence Service official said the terrorist threat had become more diffuse, with regional affiliates playing a greater role as the core of Al Qaeda had been diminished.