Police emergency autos stand at a cordon within the metropolis middle of Solingen, Germany, within the early morning of Sunday, Aug. 25, 2024, following Friday’s lethal assault on the metropolis’s 650th anniversary celebrations.
Thomas Banneyer/AP/DPA
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Thomas Banneyer/AP/DPA
SOLINGEN, Germany — A 26-year-old Syrian asylum-seeker turned himself into police, saying he was answerable for the Solingen knife assault that left three lifeless and eight wounded at a competition marking the town’s 650th anniversary, German authorities introduced early Sunday.
Duesseldorf police stated in a joint assertion with the prosecutor’s workplace that the person “said that he was answerable for the assault.”
“This individual’s involvement within the crime is at the moment being intensively investigated,” the assertion stated.
The suspect is a Syrian citizen who had utilized for asylum in Germany, police confirmed to The Related Press.
On Saturday the Islamic State militant group claimed accountability for the assault, with out offering proof. The extremist group stated on its information web site that the attacker focused Christians and that he carried out the assaults Friday night time “to avenge Muslims in Palestine and in every single place.” The declare couldn’t be independently verified.
The assault comes amid debate over immigration forward of regional elections subsequent Sunday in Germany’s Saxony and Thueringia areas the place anti-immigration events such because the populist Different for Germany are anticipated to do nicely. In June, Chancellor Olaf Scholz vowed that the nation would begin deporting criminals from Afghanistan and Syria once more after a knife assault by an Afghan immigrant left one police officer lifeless and 4 extra individuals injured.
The assault raised fears that Europe may face one other wave of terror assaults. On Saturday, a synagogue in France was focused in an arson assault. French police stated they made an arrest early Sunday.
Friday’s assault plunged the town of Solingen into shock and grief. A metropolis of about 160,000 residents close to the larger cities of Cologne and Duesseldorf, Solingen was holding a “Pageant of Range” to rejoice its anniversary.
The competition started Friday and was alleged to run via Sunday, with a number of levels in central streets providing points of interest comparable to stay music, cabaret and acrobatics. The assault befell in entrance of 1 stage.
The competition was canceled as police appeared for clues within the cordoned-off sq..
As a substitute residents gathered to mourn the lifeless and injured, putting flowers and notes close to the scene of the assault.
“Warum?” requested one signal positioned amid candles and teddy bears. Why?
Amongst these asking themselves the query was 62-year-old Twine Boetther, a service provider fron Solingen.
“Why does one thing like this should be carried out? It’s incomprehensible and it hurts,” Boetther stated.
Officers had earlier stated a 15-year-old boy was arrested on suspicion he knew concerning the deliberate assault and failed to tell authorities, however that he was not the attacker. Two feminine witnesses advised police they overheard the boy and an unknown individual earlier than the assault talking about intentions that corresponded to the bloodshed, officers stated.
Individuals alerted police shortly after 9:30 p.m. native time Friday {that a} man had assaulted a number of individuals with a knife on the town’s central sq., the Fronhof. The three individuals killed had been two males aged 67 and 56 and a 56-year-old girl, authorities stated. Police stated the attacker appeared to have intentionally aimed for his victims’ throats.
The IS militant group declared its caliphate in massive elements of Iraq and Syria a few decade in the past, however now holds no management over any land and has misplaced many outstanding leaders. The group is generally out of world information headlines.
Nonetheless, it continues to recruit members and declare accountability for lethal assaults world wide, together with deadly operations in Iran and Russia earlier this yr that killed dozens of individuals. Its sleeper cells in Syria and Iraq nonetheless perform assaults on authorities forces in each nations in addition to U.S.-backed Syrian fighters.
