Italy police on Wednesday arrested two men planning attacks in the name of the Islamic State (IS) group.

The 24-year old Italian and 18-year old Moroccan were nabbed in northern Italy after posting IS images and videos on social networks, police said.

The pair were "ready to attack", according to media reports citing prosecutors, , which said they had been plotting an attack on Italian soil after their plans to travel to Syria to fight were thwarted by the defeat of IS.

The suspects had downloaded video instructions on how to carry out bombings and suicide attacks, police said. 

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.