Following the suspected Islamist attack on the Christopher Street Day in Berlin, Chancellor Friedrich Merz has announced decisive political consequences. The 21-year-old perpetrator Abdul B. had previously served a youth sentence and was released.
The attack occurred on Saturday evening on the sidelines of the CSD in Berlin. Abdul B., a 21-year-old German with Lebanese roots and links to Islamist terror, drove a van into people and attacked with a stabbing weapon. A woman from Poland died, and 29 others were partly seriously injured. The perpetrator was shot by police on Sunday evening during his arrest in Berlin-Spandau.
Merz said on Monday in Berlin that it must be clarified how the man classified as dangerous could carry out the attack unhindered. „We will do everything to protect and defend this freedom, the openness, the liberality of our society“, the CDU politician emphasized.
Green politician Anna Gallina, chair of the Justice Ministers' Conference, first called for intensive processing. „Quick demands may look striking, but they do not do justice without intensive prior analysis of the situation“, she told Funke Medien. Thuringia's Office for the Protection of the Constitution president Stephan Kramer warned of increasing radicalization among young people and demanded more powers for authorities.
