Police officers stand in front of a bus on a special route to a city festival in Siegen, Germany, Friday, Aug. 30, 2024, after a suspect allegedly attacked other passengers on the bus with a knife.
| Photo Credit: AP

Police arrested a 32-year-old woman after six people were hurt in a knife attack on a bus headed to a festival in western Germany. Authorities said on Saturday (August 31, 2024) that there was no evidence of a political or religious motive.

Three of those attacked are in life-threatening condition, police said on Friday (August 30, 2024) evening.

The knife attack took place in Siegen, east of Cologne. The bus was on its way to a local festival in the town and at least another 40 people were on board when the attack took place at about 7:40 p.m.

Police and prosecutors said the six people wounded were aged between 16 and 30 and all were from the region. By Saturday morning, three of them had left the hospital after outpatient treatment.

Local authorities planned to go ahead with the festival.

The stabbing in Siegen happened a week after a knife attack in Solingen, a city in the same state of North Rhine-Westphalia, in which a suspected Islamic extremist from Syria who had avoided being deported is accused of killing three people and wounding another eight.

The Solingen attack prompted the governing coalition to draw up plans to tighten knife laws and make deportations easier.

Police said the woman arrested in Siegen was a German citizen with no immigrant roots.

Berlin:

 On Friday evening, a violent incident occurred on a bus in Siegen, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, leaving five people injured after a woman attacked them with a knife, local police confirmed, Xinhua reported.

Notably, the woman has been arrested.

The police informed that three persons were in life-threatening conditions. At least 40 other passengers were on the bus at the time of the incident. No further danger is posed, police said, according to Xinhua.

According to German newspaper Bild, the attacker is believed to be a German national, with indications suggesting that they may have been struggling with mental health issues and potentially under the influence of drugs. The police has clarified that they do not suspect terrorism to be a motivating factor.

The incident comes days after a Syrian man brought himself in and admitted to stabbing three people to death and several others at a festival in the western German city of Solingen on Friday, CNN reported citing the police.

The incident claimed the lives of two men, ages 67 and 56, and a lady, age 56.

It stunned Germany and led opposition parties to demand stricter immigration laws. The 26-year-old is accused by German prosecutors of being an ISIS member. Via its Amaq news agency, the terrorist group claimed responsibility for the incident. But it provided no proof to support that claim.

In a statement, prosecutors said that due to his “radical Islamist convictions, [the suspect] decided to kill as many people as possible at the Solingen city festival.”

The suspect went on a significant manhunt before turning himself in. The man stated, “I’m the one you’re looking for,” to the officers while covered in blood, according to the daily Bild, reported CNN.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Berlin:

German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said Thursday the government would toughen knife controls and limit the support given to some illegal migrants following a suspected Islamist stabbing.

Three people were killed and eight others injured at a festival in the western city of Solingen on Friday, in an attack allegedly carried out by a 26-year-old Syrian man with links to the Islamic State group.

The knife attack has inflamed the debate over immigration in Germany and put pressure on the government to act ahead of key regional elections on Sunday.

The stabbing has “shocked us deeply”, Faeser said at a press conference on Thursday.

In response to the threat highlighted by the attack, the government is preparing “tough measures”, Faeser said alongside Justice Minister Marco Buschmann.

Carrying knives at festivals, like the one in Solingen, as well as “sports events and other similar public events” will be banned, Faeser said.

There will be reasoned exceptions to the ban, including for those working in hospitality and performers, she added.

A ban will also be introduced on long-distance trains, the minister said, with police given more powers to search members of the public for knives.

Germany will also refuse benefits payments to migrants set to be deported to other countries in the European Union, Faeser announced.

The government will continue to work “intensively” to restart deportations to Afghanistan and Syria, which have been halted for years, she said.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz arrives at the town hall before visiting the site where three people were killed and several injured in a stabbing attack at a festival, in Solingen, Germany, August 26, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Via Reuters

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Monday (August 26, 2024) that the government would tighten weapons controls and speed up deportations after a suspected Islamist knife attack in the western city of Solingen.

Friday night’s deadly stabbing at a street festival has reignited a debate over immigration in the country and put extra pressure on Mr. Scholz ahead of key regional elections set for Sunday (September 1) .

Explained | Gun laws in countries outside the U.S.

“This was terrorism, terrorism against us all,” Mr. Scholz said on a visit to Solingen, where he laid flowers at a memorial to the victims.

A 26-year-old Syrian with suspected links to the Islamic State group is alleged to have carried out the attack, which left three people dead and eight more wounded.

Mr. Scholz said he was “angry… at the Islamists who threaten our peaceful coexistence”.

“We will now have to tighten up the weapons regulations… in particular with regard to the use of knives,” Mr. Scholz said.

Stronger weapons controls would come “very quickly”, Mr. Scholz said.

Germany would also have to “do everything we can to ensure that those who cannot and must not stay here in Germany are repatriated and deported,” Mr. Scholz said.

Islamic state link

The suspect, named Issa Al H., was able to evade the police after the attack before reportedly handing himself into law enforcement on Saturday evening.

The Syrian was detained on suspicion of murder, attempted murder and belonging to a “terrorist group”.

The Islamic State group on Saturday (August 24) said one of its members had carried out the attack in an act of “revenge”.

The group subsequently published a video via the jihadists’ Amaq news agency purporting to show the Solingen attack, in which the veiled man said he intended to carry out reprisals for “massacres” in the Middle East and beyond.

The claim could not be immediately verified.

The suspected attacker has raised concerns in Germany for the seeming ease with which he avoided authorities attempts to remove him.

According to the Bild and Spiegel news outlets, the suspect arrived in Germany in December 2022 and had a protected immigration status often given to those fleeing war-torn Syria.

He was meant to have been deported to Bulgaria, where he had first arrived in the European Union, but he went missing.

The suspect was not known to German security services as a dangerous extremist, according to officials.

Immigration debate

According to federal police figures, almost 52,976 people were supposed to be deported or expelled from Germany last year.

Successful deportations however only took place in 21,206 instances — less than half of the total planned — often because the individuals concerned were “not handed over” to police.

The attack spurred a new debate around immigration in the EU’s most populous country ahead of regional elections next weekend in Saxony and Thuringia, where the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) is set to make gains.

The attack would strengthen the perception that the government was “overwhelmed”, Ursula Muench, the director of the Academy for Political Education, said.

The AfD has accused successive governments of contributing to “chaos” by allowing in too many immigrants, and called for a stop to new entries.

Friedrich Merz, the leader of the CDU, Germany’s main opposition party, meanwhile urged the government to stop taking in refugees from Syria and Afghanistan.

The government — a fraught coalition between Scholz’s Social Democrats, the Greens, and the pro-business FDP — had already announced moves to toughen immigration rules.

Following an attack by a 25-year-old Afghan at an anti-Islam rally in Mannheim in May, the government said it would look to restart deportations directly to Afghanistan and Syria after years in which they were halted.

German security services have been on high alert for Islamist attacks since the Gaza war erupted on October 7 with the Hamas attacks on Israel.

Germany has been hit by several such attacks in recent years, with the most deadly being a truck rampage at a Berlin Christmas market in 2016 that killed 12 people.

Police officer stands, as a vehicle leaves, after a person was detained, following an incident in which several individuals were killed after a man randomly stabbed passers-by with a knife at a city festival, in Solingen, Germany on August 24, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

German police on Saturday (August 24, 2024) arrested the suspect behind a knife rampage that left three people dead at a local festival in an attack claimed by the Islamic State group.

The assailant fled after striking in the western town of Solingen late on Friday (August 23, 2024), sparking a day-long manhunt.

“We have just arrested the true suspect,” North Rhine-Westphalia region Interior Minister Herbert Reul said on public television late Saturday evening.

“The man we have been looking for all day has, since a short time ago, been [put] in detention,” he said, adding that police had evidence to convict him.

In a statement on Telegram, IS’s Amaq propaganda arm said “the perpetrator of the attack on a gathering of Christians in the city of Solingen in Germany yesterday was a soldier of the Islamic State”.

IS said the attack was carried out as “revenge for Muslims in Palestine and everywhere”, in an apparent reference to Israel’s war with Palestinian militant group Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

The claim has yet to be verified. German officials have said that “a terrorist motive cannot be excluded”.

According to the newspapers Bild and Spiegel, the suspect was a 26-year-old Syrian who arrived in Germany in December 2022 and had been granted a protected immigration status often given to those fleeing the war-torn country.

He was not previously known to the security services as an extremist, the outlets reported.

A police spokesman had told AFP earlier that officers had arrested a man in a raid at a hostel for asylum seekers, not far from the scene of Friday’s attack.

Earlier on Saturday (August 24, 2024), a prosecutor said a first person was arrested: a 15-year-old suspected of failing to report a criminal act.

Witnesses had allegedly seen the teen discussing the attack just before it happened with a man who could be the knifeman, said Markus Caspers, prosecutor of Duesseldorf, just west of Solingen.

The people killed were men of 56 and 67 years of age and a 56-year-old woman, officials said.

“The victims were completely unknown with no known ties between them,” Mr. Caspers told a press conference.

Four of the wounded were in a “serious” condition, officials said, revising down an earlier estimate of five.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz said the perpetrator “must be caught quickly and punished”.

The attacker struck as thousands of people gathered for the first night of a “Festival of Diversity”, part of a series of events to mark Solingen’s 650th anniversary.

High terror alert

Germany has been on high alert for possible Islamist attacks after a series of atrocities.

Since the outbreak of the war in Gaza on October 7, the risk of Islamist plots has “worsened considerably”, Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said, warning that “the threat posed by Islamist terrorism remains high”.

Jihadists have carried out several attacks in Germany in recent years, the deadliest being a truck rampage at a Berlin Christmas market in 2016 that killed 12.

A police officer was killed and five people were wounded in a knife attack at a far-right rally in the city of Mannheim in May, with an Islamist motive suspected.

Friday’s killing started as thousands of people had gathered in front of a stage for the festival’s first night.

Witness Lars Breitzke told the Solinger Tageblatt newspaper he was a few metres away from the attack, not far from the stage, and “understood from the expression on the singer’s face that something was wrong”.

“And then, a metre away from me, a person fell,” said Mr. Breitzke, who at first thought it was someone who had had too much to drink.

When he turned around, he saw other people lying on the ground amid pools of blood.

Solingen mayor Tim-Oliver Kurzbach said the whole city was in “shock, horror and great grief”.

Ms. Faeser called for the country to “remain united” as she denounced “those who want to stir up hatred” during a visit to the site of the tragedy. “Let us not be divided”, she said.

Series of knifings

Solingen is a city of some 1,50,000 people located between Duesseldorf and Cologne.

People had gathered in the town on Friday evening for the first day of the three-day “Festival of Diversity” with music and shows scheduled.

Up to 75,000 visitors had been expected to attend.

After the attack, “people left the scene in shock, but calmly,” Philipp Mueller, one of the organisers, told the newspaper, adding that the rest of the festival was cancelled.

Mr. Scholz’s centre-left coalition faces regional elections next week in the east of the country, where the far-right AfD is leading strongly in the polls.

Germany took in more than a million asylum seekers in 2015-2016 at the height of Europe’s migrant crisis.

The influx was deeply divisive in Germany and fuelled the popularity of the AfD.

A woman writes on a placard near tributes placed on the ground following an incident in which several individuals were killed after a man randomly stabbed passers-by with a knife at a city festival, in Solingen, Germany, on August 24, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Special police units on Saturday (August 24, 2024) joined the search for an unknown man who carried out a stabbing attack at a crowded festival in the western German city of Solingen, killing three people and wounding at least eight others, five of them seriously.

Markus Caspers, from the counterterrorism section of the public prosecutors office, told a news conference on Saturday (August 24, 2024) that authorities have not found the perpetrator. He said a terrorist motivation could not be ruled out.

A 15-year-old boy was arrested early Saturday (August 24, 2024). Police said he was suspected of knowing about the planned attack and not informing authorities but he was not the attacker.

“The police are currently conducting a large-scale search for the perpetrator,” police said in a statement. “Both victims and witnesses are currently being questioned,” they said.

Police warned people to stay vigilant even as wellwishers started to leave flowers at the scene. Police established an online portal where witnesses could upload footage and any other information relevant to the attack.

People alerted police shortly after 9:30 p.m. Friday (August 23, 2024) to an unknown attacker having wounded several people with a knife on a central square, the Fronhof. Police said they believe the stabbings were carried out by a lone attacker and gave no information about the identities of the victims.

“Last night our hearts were torn apart. We in Solingen are full of horror and grief. What happened yesterday in our city has hardly let any of us sleep,” the mayor of Solingen, Tim Kurzbach, said, speaking to reporters on Saturday (August 24, 2024) near the scene of the attack.

The “Festival of Diversity,” marking the city’s 650th anniversary, began Friday (August 23, 2024) and was supposed to run through Sunday (August 25, 2024), with several stages in central streets offering attractions such as live music, cabaret and acrobatics.

The attack took place in the crowd in front of one stage. Hours after the attack, the stage lights were still on as police and forensic investigators looked for clues in the cordoned-off square.

One of the festival organizers, Philipp Müller, appeared on stage on Friday (August 23, 2024) and asked festivalgoers to “go calmly; please keep your eyes open, because unfortunately the perpetrator hasn’t been caught.” Solingen has about 160,000 residents and is located near the bigger cities of Cologne and Duesseldorf.

The rest of the festival was cancelled.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Saturday (August 24, 2024) that the perpetrator of the attack must be caught quickly and punished with the full force of the law.

“The attack in Solingen is a terrible event that has shocked me greatly. An attacker has brutally killed several people. I have just spoken to Solingen’s mayor, Tim Kurzbach. We mourn the victims and stand by their families,” Mr. Scholz said on X.

German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier also spoke to the mayor of Solingen on Saturday (August 24, 2024) morning.

“The heinous act in Solingen shocks me and our country. We mourn those killed and worry about those injured and I wish them strength and a speedy recovery from all my heart,” Steinmeier said in a statement on Saturday. (August 24, 2024).

“The perpetrator needs to be brought to justice. Let’s stand together — against hatred and violence.”

There has been concern about increased knife violence in Germany, and Interior Minister Nancy Faeser recently proposed toughening weapons laws to allow only knives with a blade measuring up to 6cm to be carried in public, rather than the length of 12cm that is currently allowed.

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