The attack left Europe facing a disturbing new threat: the lone suicide bomber. Daleel sought asylum in Germany two years ago.
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It is thought the attacker was carrying the bomb in a rucksack which contained sharp bits of metal, and Roman Fertinger, the deputy police chief in nearby Nuremberg, said it was likely there would have been more casualties if he had not been barred from the festival. Before the attack, the 27-year-old had pledged allegiance to the so-called “Islamic State” (IS) militant group’s leader in a mobile video found later, authorities said, vowing to take “revenge against Germans for obstructing Islam”. In the overwhelming number of cases, reports turn out to be false.
The IS-linked Aamaq news agency said the man carried out the attack in response to calls by the group to target countries of the USA -led coalition that is fighting IS.
A Syrian migrant set off an explosion at a bar in southern Germany that killed himself and wounded a dozen others, authorities said about the third attack to hit Bavaria in a week. Berlin said there was as yet “no credible evidence” of a link to Islamic extremism.
The incident marked the fourth bloody attack in seven days in Germany, with all but one – a mall shooting on Friday by an German teenager of Iranian descent – involving recently arrived asylum seekers.
Officials said the bomber had also been detained for drug possession and other minor offenses.
Mr de Maizere announced that security measures would be raised at train stations, airports and border areas across Germany.
Ansbach has a population of about 40,000 and is a major US military garrison town, with around 5,000 members of the military living there along with civilians, contractors and retirees.
The teen was taken into custody late Sunday for questioning after police said they were able to retrieve a deleted chat between him and the suspect on the messaging app WhatsApp. “Two people lay on the ground with head and neck injuries”, said eyewitness Kevin Krieger to Sat-1 television. We all looked back. A man from security ran to the entrance. There were two people on the ground. However, the man managed to stay in Germany because he had medical certificates proving mental instability.
These laws present a major problem for German officials attempting to deport any Syrian refugees they might consider unsafe or undesirable. The deportation order was suspended, but it was reactivated again and proceedings started on 13 July this year. There was, however, no verification of this. “It is new for me to feel this way”, she said, as translated from Hebrew. “He wanted to be the centre of attention, he needed attention”.
The domestic policy spokesman for the Social Democrats’ (SPD) parliamentary group, Burkhard Luschka, agreed that “we have to be better at enforcement” and that “asylum seekers or refugees who are rejected have to leave Germany”. “This is absolutely shameful”.
“Of course I would and will initiate appropriate amendments if they are necessary or if I think they are necessary, but only then”, he said, as quoted by Reuters.
As a rule, Germany does not deport people to countries in the grip of civil war, such as Syria, but it was preparing to remove Daleel to Bulgaria, his first point of entry in the EU.
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“I don’t have anything against foreigners, asylum-seekers, I don’t feel anything more against them”, she said.
