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Suspected Islamist held over Borussia Dortmund attack

KARLSRUHE/DUSSELDORF (Germany) — German authorities arrested a suspected Islamist on Wednesday (April 12) in connection with an attack on a bus carrying players of one of the country’s top football teams, said a spokeswoman for the Federal Prosecutor’s Office.

A window of the bus of Borussia Dortmund is damaged after an explosion before the Champions League quarterfinal soccer match against AS Monaco in Dortmund, western Germany. Photo: AP

A window of the bus of Borussia Dortmund is damaged after an explosion before the Champions League quarterfinal soccer match against AS Monaco in Dortmund, western Germany. Photo: AP

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KARLSRUHE/DUSSELDORF (Germany) — German authorities arrested a suspected Islamist on Wednesday (April 12) in connection with an attack on a bus carrying players of one of the country’s top football teams, said a spokeswoman for the Federal Prosecutor’s Office.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s spokesman said she was “appalled” by Tuesday evening’s attack on the Borussia Dortmund bus, in which Spanish defender Marc Bartra was injured.

Mr Ralf Jager, Interior Minister in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, which includes Dortmund, said the investigation was looking “in all directions”, and it was unclear if one or several attackers were involved.

He raised the possibility that the note found at the scene could be “an attempt to lay a false trail”. 

The spokeswoman for the federal prosecutors, who handle probes into suspected terrorism, said investigators had found three letters near the scene of the attack, all with the same content suggesting a possible Islamist motive.

Spokeswoman Frauke Koehler said the letters referred to the use of Tornado reconnaissance planes in Syria, which Germany has deployed as part of the military campaign against Islamic State. 

The letters also called for the closure of an American military base at Ramstein in western Germany.

She also noted an online claim of responsibility by an anti-fascist group, but said there was serious doubt about its validity.

Investigators have identified two suspects from the “Islamist scene”, searched their apartments and detained one man, she said.

The blasts smashed windows on the bus carrying the players to the stadium for the match against AS Monaco. Mr Bartra was operated on for a broken bone in his right wrist and shrapnel in his arm, said a team spokesman.

A policeman was also injured. The blast had a radius of more than 100m, said federal prosecutors, adding it was lucky the toll was not higher. A defiant Dortmund vowed not to “give in to terror”, with players returning to the pitch for training.

The attack forced a 24-hour postponement of the team’s high-profile clash with AS Monaco. In a show of solidarity, German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said he would 
attend the match.

Officials said security had been stepped up for the Dortmund-Monaco game as well as another Champions League quarter-final in Germany between Bayern Munich and Real Madrid.

Mrs Merkel’s spokesman Steffen Seibert told a news conference on Wednesday that “the chancellor was, last night, like people in Dortmund, like millions everywhere, appalled by the attack on the BVB team bus”. “One can only be relieved that the consequences were not worse,” he said, praising Dortmund fans for offering accommodation to AS Monaco fans after the postponement.

Mr Peter Sobeck, a 55-year-old city planner who described himself as a lifelong Dortmund fan, said he was shocked that players were targeted in a relatively small city such as Dortmund.

The western city, located in Germany’s densely populated Ruhr industrial region, has less than 600,000 residents.

“I thought (in) these great cities, Paris or Munich or London, something like that. But, in Dortmund, I never thought that,’’ he said.

Security is among the issues at the heart of Germany’s parliamentary election on Sept 24, a tight battle in which Mrs Merkel is running for a fourth term. 

In December, a Tunisian man killed 12 people when he ploughed a truck through a Berlin Christmas market. AGENCIES

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