Five arrested over plot to attack German Christmas market

Five men have been arrested in Germany suspected of being involved in a plot to drive a vehicle into people at a Christmas market.

Three Moroccans, an Egyptian and a Syrian were detained on Friday over the plan to target a market in the southern Bavarian state. Authorities said they suspected an “Islamist motive”.

Prosecutors said the Egyptian – a 56-year-old – was alleged to have “called for a vehicle attack… with the aim of killing or injuring as many people as possible”. The Moroccans allegedly agreed to carry out the attack.

Officials in Germany have been on high alert after previous attacks at Christmas markets, including in Magdeburg last December that killed six people.

Authorities did not say when the planned attack was supposed to take place or which market was the target, though said they believed it to be one in the Dingolfing-Landau area, north east of Munich.

German newspaper Bild reported the Egyptian man was an imam at a mosque in the area.

Police said the Moroccan men – aged 30, 28 and 22 – were arrested accused of having agreed to commit murder, while the Syrian man, a 37-year-old, was accused of encouraging the suspects “in their decision to commit the crime”.

The five suspects appeared before a magistrate on Saturday and remain in custody.

Joachim Herrmann, Bavaria’s state interior minister, told Bild the “excellent cooperation between our security services” had helped to prevent “a potentially Islamist-motivated attack”.

Christmas markets are popular festive attractions throughout Germany, frequently attracting large crowds and significant tourism.

Security at events has been increased in recent years, since an attack in Berlin in 2016 when a man drove a lorry into a market crowd, killing 12 people.