With Germany stunned by a series of bloody attacks, Chancellor Angela Merkel called Thursday for an “early warning system” to detect radicalisation among asylum seekers even as she insisted the nation still had a moral duty to offer sanctuary to those fleeing war.
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The four incidents since 18 July included an axe-and-knife attack on a commuter train near Wuerzburg, a mass shooting in Munich, a knife attack in Reutlingen and a suicide bombing in Ansbach.
The deadliest recent attack – in Munich on July 22 which left nine persons dead – was carried out by a German-Iranian teenager but was not associated with the IS terrorist group.
Germany accepted more than 1 million refugees in 2015, and Merkel’s bold stance on the issue – at the same time as some European countries and some USA states have moved to bar refugees – won her the honor of Time’s Person of the Year in 2015.
Merkel used her appearance at the press conference to announce that the recent attacks would be analyzed in order to determine what steps will keep Germany safe.
While broad swathes of the political establishment and media have responded with unity in the wake of the attacks, some lawmakers in Merkel’s Christian Democratic-led bloc as well as politicians from the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany party, or AfD, have revived criticism that Merkel has invited a security threat with her accommodating refugee policy.
“We made a decision to fulfill our humanitarian tasks”, she told reporters at a news conference, according to a translator.
But she added that those who came to Germany as refugees but then carry out attacks “mock the country that took them in”.
The attacks have burst any illusions in Germany that the country is immune to attacks like those claimed by the so-called Islamic State in neighbouring France.
She said that Germany will “stick to our principles” and give shelter to those who deserve it. She is sticking to her insistence previous year that Germany “will manage” the challenges it faces.
Merkel said of the plan that “there are a lot of things on which we agree”. It is for that reason, she said, that “internal and external security can no longer be distinguished from each other”.
“Civilisational taboos are being broken, deeds are done in places we all could be in”, Merkel said. Last year Merkel claimed “we can do this”, in reference to Germany choosing to take in more refugee from war torn countries.
She remains a steady, unemotional leader who said recently: “Fear has never been a good adviser, neither in our personal lives nor in our society”.
‘They see hatred and fear between cultures and they see hatred and fear between religions. There are also plans to boost the exchange of intelligence with the U.S., reports the New York Times.
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Further attacks – particularly if they are linked to recently arrived refugees – will make her vulnerable at next year’s elections.
