German security chiefs face questions over Christmas market attack

German security and intelligence chiefs faced questioning Monday about the car-ramming attack that killed five people and wounded more than 200 at a Christmas market 10 days ago.

They were to be quizzed about possible missed clues and security failures before the December 20 attack in the eastern city of Magdeburg, where police arrested a Saudi psychiatrist, Taleb al-Abdulmohsen, at the scene.

Interior Minister Nancy Faeser, Saxony-Anhalt state officials and the heads of Germany's federal police and its domestic and foreign intelligence services attended a closed-door committee hearing in parliament, and Faeser was to address the media later.

Abdulmohsen, 50, is the only suspect in the attack in which a rented BMW sport utility vehicle ploughed through the crowd of revelers at high speed, leaving a bloody trail of carnage.

The car that was rammed into a large crowd of revellers at a Magdeburg Christmas market is seen following the attack in Magdeburg, Germany December 21, 2024. Reuters

Investigators have yet to declare a suspected motive in the assault that used a motor vehicle as a weapon, a method previously used in attacks including in Berlin and in the French city of Nice in 2016.

Abdulmohsen, by contrast, has voiced strongly anti-Islam views and sympathies with the far right in his social media posts, as well as anger at Germany for allowing in too many Muslim war refugees and other asylum-seekers.

According to media reports citing unnamed German security sources, he has in the past been treated for mental illness and tested positive for drug use on the night of his arrest.

Abdulmohsen has been remanded in custody on five counts of murder and 205 counts of attempted murder, prosecutors said, but so far not on terrorism-related charges.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz visits the site where a car drove into a crowd of a Christmas market in Magdeburg, Germany December 21, 2024. Reuters

Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who faces a general election in February, has declared that Germany needs to "investigate whether this terrible act could have been prevented".

"No stone must be left unturned," he told news portal T-online on Friday.

"Over the years, there have been repeated clues" about the suspect, Scholz said, adding that "we must examine very carefully whether there were any failings on the part of the authorities in Saxony-Anhalt or at the national level".

German media investigations of Abdulmohsen's past and his countless social media postings have found expressions of anger and frustration, and threats of violence against German citizens and politicians.

Saudi Arabia said it had repeatedly warned Germany about Abdulmohsen, who came to Germany in 2006 and was granted refugee status 10 years later.

A source close to the Saudi government told AFP that the kingdom had in the past sought his extradition.

Germany has not officially commented on this claim, but it usually denies requests to send people granted asylum back to the country they fled.

Police and ambulances next to the Christmas market in Magdeburg. AFP

Abdulmohsen also had a history of brushes with the law and court appearances in Germany, media have reported, including for threats of violence.

German police have said they had contacted Abdulmohsen in September 2023 and October 2024, and then repeatedly tried but failed to meet him again in December.

Police hold such meetings with people deemed a potential threat to make clear they are under close watch and to deter misconduct.

Ahead of February's election, the Christmas market bloodshed has reignited heated debate about immigration and security, after deadly knife attacks this year blamed on extremists.

The head of the conservative opposition, Friedrich Merz, wrote in a newsletter last week that whether the attacker was a jihadist or an anti-Islam activist, "conflicts are being fought out on German soil... We have to stop this!"