A Syrian man killed himself and injured 12 people after detonating a bomb near an open air music festival in Ansbach, in Germany. “We do not know at the moment whether the offender purely wanted to commit suicide or whether his intention was to take other people into death”, said Joachim Herrmann, interior minister of Bavaria state, early Monday morning. On this occasion, a Syrian asylum seeker blew himself up outside a festival in the Bavarian town of Ansbach. The man has been identified as a failed Syrian asylum seeker, but is not believed to have had any terrorist links.
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The unidentified man had repeatedly received psychiatric treatment, including twice for attempted suicide, authorities said, and had been known to police for drug possession. This attack, which happened on 18 July, has been claimed by the so-called Islamic State.
Herrmann has not ruled out the possibility of the incident being an Islamist-inspired attack and pointed out that the man’s backpack was filled with explosives and metal parts that would have been sufficient to kill more people.
Roman Fertinger, the deputy police chief in nearby Nuremberg, said there likely would have been more casualties if the man had not been turned away.
The three-day open-air concert was underway, with about 2,500 in attendance.
“It’s awful. that someone who came into our country to seek shelter has now committed such a heinous act and injured a large number of people who are at home here, some seriously”.
Herrmann said the attacker’s backpack contained screws and nails, in an apparent bid to inflict widespread damage.
The Ansbach bombing is the third attack in the southern German state of Bavaria in recent days, a spate of violence that has rattled the country and fueled criticism of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s immigration policies.
Police say they have arrested a 16-year-old Afghan in relation with a deadly rampage at a Munich mall that killed nine people and left dozens wounded.
Thiss comes after Germany saw another tragedy when an 18-year-old gunman killed nine people in Munich last week.
After the Munich attack, Herrmann urged the German government to allow the country’s military to be deployed to support police during attacks.
Police said the woman was 45 years old and from Poland. He said he could not exclude the possibility of an Islamist-inspired attack, but said that would have to be confirmed by an investigation.
The 17-year-old attacker was an Afghan asylum-seeker who assaulted the group of Hong Kong tourists on a train near Wuerzburg before jumping off and attacking a woman walking her dog. Police said that he had planned the attack for a year.
At least 35 people were also wounded during Sonboly’s attack, which began at a McDonald’s outlet and ended with him turning his 9mm Glock pistol on himself. Both were being treated for online game addiction, among other things. More than a million migrants have entered Germany over the past year, many fleeing war in Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq.
“Germany is an attractive country because it respects the dignity of every human being”, an educational film shown to newcomers said, “and it is supposed to stay that way”.
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Grieshaber reported from Berlin.
