Germany’s Christmas markets focused in terror assaults for greater than 10 years
Germany‘s Christmas markets have been a target for attacks for nearly a decade.
This evening’s tragedy echoes the devastation seen in 2016 when a truck was driven through Berlin’s Christmas market by an Islamic extremist.
An HGV ploughed into a crowd of pedestrians on December 19 that year, leaving 13 dead and injuring dozens.
One of the victims was the original Polish truck driver who was found dead in the cab, having been stabbed and shot.
The attacker, failed Tunisian asylum seeker Anis Amri, was killed four days later by police during a shootout in Milan, Italy.
He had arrived in Germany a year and a half earlier. The 24-year-old, who used 14 different identities during his time in the country, had been on a list of potentially violent Islamic extremists.
An HGV ploughed into a crowd of pedestrians on December 19 2016, leaving 13 dead and injuring dozens. Pictured: Heavily-armed police walk through the reopened Breitscheidplatz Christmas market three days after the attack
Politicians lay candles during a memorial service on the fourth anniversary of the Islamist attack on the Christmas market at Breitscheidplatz
A car drove into a group of people at a Christmas market in the eastern German city of Magdeburg this evening, leaving at least 11 dead and nearly 70 injured
The terror seen that night had, mercifully, not been repeated since, though there have been numerous subsequent attempts or planned attacks on other Christmas markets.
In June, a 15-year-old German-Afghan boy was sentenced to four years for plotting an attack in Leverkusen, in western Germany, the previous Christmas.
A 16-year-old Russian national was also arrested in connection with the plot last year.
A court ruled that the Islamist-motivated teen had planned to kill ‘unbelievers’ by driving a rented truck into visitors in the same manner as was seen in 2016.
Recent weeks have seen a series of security incidents at Christmas markets.
On December 1 in Schoneck, Saxony, the mayor and another individual were shot at with a Softair pistol, but nobody was harmed.
And three days later a 37-year-old Iraqi national was arrested in Augsburg, Bavaria, for allegedly financing terrorism, scouting the Christkindlesmarkt, and sharing Islamic State propaganda.
