MAGDEBURG, Germany (AP) — 5 folks had been killed, together with a 9-year-old, after a Saudi physician drove right into a Christmas market teeming with vacation consumers within the German metropolis of Magdeburg, officers stated Saturday, as folks mourned the victims and their shaken sense of safety.
Metropolis official Ronni Krug didn’t present additional info on the adults killed within the assault on Friday evening. He stated 200 folks had been injured, of whom 41 had been in critical or very critical situation.
Thi Linh Chi Nguyen, a 34-year-old manicurist from Vietnam — whose salon is positioned in a mall throughout the Christmas market — was on the telephone throughout a break when stated she heard loud bangs and thought at first they had been fireworks. She then noticed a automobile drive via the market at excessive velocity, as folks screamed and a baby was thrown into the air.
The girl recalled seeing the automobile bursting out of the market and turning proper onto Ernst-Reuter-Allee avenue after which coming to a standstill on the tram cease the place the suspect was arrested.
The market itself was nonetheless cordoned off Saturday with red-and-white tape and police vans each 50 meters. Police with machine pistols guarded each entry to the market. Some thermal safety blankets nonetheless lay on the road.
Prosecutors stated the suspect, a 50-year-old Saudi physician, is below investigation on suspicion of homicide, tried homicide and bodily hurt.
A number of German media shops recognized the suspect as Taleb A., withholding his final title in keeping with privateness legal guidelines. They reported that he was a specialist in psychiatry and psychotherapy. He has lived in Germany since 2006, practising medication in Bernburg, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) south of Magdeburg, officers stated.
Taleb’s X account describes him as a former Muslim. It’s crammed with tweets and retweets specializing in anti-Islam themes and criticism of the faith, whereas sharing congratulatory notes to Muslims who left the religion. He was essential of German authorities, saying they’d did not do sufficient to fight the “Islamism of Europe.” He has additionally voiced help for the far-right and anti-immigrant Various for Germany (AfD) get together.
Some described Taleb as an activist who helped Saudi girls flee their homeland. Lately, he appeared centered on his idea that German authorities have been focusing on Saudi asylum-seekers.
However there have been nonetheless no direct solutions Saturday as to what motivated Taleb to drive his black BMW right into a crowd within the jap German metropolis.
Prosecutors stated the motive might have been “dissatisfaction with the treatment of Saudi refugees in Germany,” however investigators are nonetheless attempting to resolve what was behind the assault.
Investigators have to investigate computer systems, cellular units and different proof, “and at the end of the day we will know, or at least hope to know, what drove him to this act.”
The violence shocked Germany and town, prompting a number of different German cities to cancel their weekend Christmas markets as a precaution, and out of solidarity with Magdeburg’s loss. Berlin saved its markets open however has elevated its police presence at them.
Germany has suffered a string of extremist assaults lately, together with a knife assault that killed three folks and wounded eight at a competition within the western metropolis of Solingen in August. These assaults have led cities to beef up safety at Christmas markets and different occasions.
Friday’s assault got here eight years after an Islamic extremist drove a truck right into a crowded Christmas market in Berlin, killing 13 folks and wounding many others. The attacker was killed days later in a shootout in Italy.
