Germany mourns five killed, hundreds wounded in Christmas market attack

MAGDEBURG: German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Saturday condemned the "terrible, insane" car-ramming attack on a crowded Christmas market that killed five people and injured more than 200.

Police arrested a 50-year-old Saudi psychiatry doctor at the scene Friday, next to the battered SUV that had ploughed through the festive crowd leaving a trail of carnage and bloodied casualties.

A sombre Scholz, dressed in black, visited the attack site Saturday with national and regional politicians in the eastern city of Magdeburg, where they laid flowers outside the main church.

Scholz said at least 40 of the injured were in a condition that people should be "worried" about them but gave no details.

He pledged that Germany would respond "with the full force of the law" to the attack. But he also called for unity in the country that has been plunged into a heated debate on immigration and security ahead of elections in February.

The centre-left chancellor said it was important "that we stick together, that we link arms, that it is not hatred that determines our coexistence but the fact that we are a community that seeks a common future."

He labelled the attack "terrible, insane" but said he was grateful for expressions of "solidarity" from many countries around the world.

"It is good to hear that we as Germans are not alone in the face of this terrible catastrophe."

'Islamophobic' views

As Germany reeled in shock from an attack that came eight years after a strike on a Berlin Christmas market claimed 13 lives, more details emerged about the Saudi man under arrest.

Taleb Jawad Al Abdulmohsen had lived in Germany since 2006 and held a permanent residence permit, working in a clinic near Magdeburg.

He had also worked as a rights activist who supported Saudi women and described himself as a "Saudi atheist". He had voiced strongly anti-Islam views, echoing the rhetoric of the far-right in social media posts and interviews.

As his views expressed online grew more radical, he accused Germany's government of a plan to "Islamise Europe" and voiced fears he was being targeted by authorities.

Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said that while she would not speculate about the motive, "the one thing" she could confirm was that the suspect had expressed an "Islamophobic" stance.

The Bild daily said an initial drug test had proved positive when police used a test kit that can detect narcotics including cannabis, cocaine and methamphetamines. This was not immediately confirmed by authorities.