The late christmas market bomber anis amri allegedly targeted a berlin shopping center for an explosives attack in 2016. This is the result of documents of investigators, which the ARD-magazine "kontraste", the "berliner morgenpost" and the RBB were able to see.
That amri, together with a french islamist and the caucasian russian magomed-ali c. It has been known for a long time that he had planned an explosive attack. What is new, however, is that clement B, who had been imprisoned in france in the meantime, had been arrested. At that time had posted on instagram a photo of the "healthy fountain center". Amri is said to have been in the shopping center for a long time one day later, as an analysis of the location data of his cell phone showed.
The terror trio then abandoned the explosives plan after all. Because the police paid a visit to the islamist from dagestan in october 2016. But only to tell him that he was being considered a radical islamist.
According to their own statements, the berlin police did not know at the time that material for a bomb was stored in the apartment. What became of the explosives is unknown. Amri hijacked on 19. December 2016 a truck, raced into the christmas market at berlin’s memorial church and killed a total of twelve people.
"It makes you feel queasy when you think about the potential impact of an explosive attack at berlin’s gesundbrunnen," said irene mihalic, the grunen chairwoman on the federal parliament’s investigation committee into the breitscheidplatz terrorist attack. The indication that a coordinated series of attacks had been planned in berlin, paris and brussel also shows that the european networking of islamist terrorism in particular "is still shockingly underexposed".
FDP interior politician benjamin strasser said there is now nothing left of the "single perpetrator theory" that dominated all investigations after the breitscheidplatz attack.
According to a response from the federal government to a small question from the afd parliamentary group, the exchange of data on islamist threats in europe has been patchy up to now. It states that the transfer of information "on personal potential relevant to state security from other EU member states to germany" is based on the laws applicable there "and is the sole responsibility of the respective state".
Information is often only passed on after an attack has taken place. For example, the federal criminal police office did not receive any information until the evening of the 11th. December 2018 knowledge that the assassin cherif chekatt in france had been included in a file of radical islamists. Chekatt had killed five people shortly before in strabburg. In october 2016, the frenchman was sentenced to imprisonment for grand larceny by the singen district court. He was deported to france at the end of february 2017.
The non-official interrogation of a dealer who had sold drugs together with amri in berlin was not very productive for the amri investigation committee on thursday evening. The tunisian, who is in jail for drug trafficking and is to be deported, did not seem very credible to the members of the committee. According to participants in the meeting, he claimed not to have known about amri’s terror plans and his enthusiasm for the ideology of the islamic state (IS) terrorist militia.
The committee also wanted to question the tunisian bilal ben ammar, who was deported in february 2017. He had met with amri on the eve of the attack. For the day of the attack, he has no alibi.
Documents from the tunisian judiciary, first reported by "zeit online," show that ben ammar was appointed on september 15. June 2017 and 11. September of the same year was questioned in his home country on terrorist charges. He admitted to selling cocaine and hashish in a german refugee shelter. He denied involvement in financing and planning terrorist activities. He said his meeting with amri in a restaurant on the eve of the attack had only served the purpose of handing over drugs.
The investigators also held up to him the testimony of another tunisian suspect who, according to the interrogation protocol, had declared that he had wanted to travel to the syrian IS region together with ben ammar and two other tunisians. The imam of a mosque in berlin-tempelhof had given them money for the trip. Ben ammar also denied this.
According to the tunisian ministry of justice, it is not known where ben ammar is currently staying. However, the federal intelligence service is said to have received a tip-off in march 2018 that he had been sentenced to several years’ imprisonment in tunisia.