Death toll in terror attack on Germany’s Christmas market rises to 5

Magdeburg: At least five people were killed and more than 200 injured after a car plowed into a crowd at a Christmas market in the German city of Magdeburg on Friday, local authorities said.
“It is unimaginable that this is happening in Germany,” Reiner Haseloff, the prime minister of Saxony-Anhalt state, said during a visit to the scene with other officials on Saturday, confirming the latest death toll which included one toddler.

Haseloff said on Friday that the suspect – who was arrested – was a 50-year-old man from Saudi Arabia who has lived in Germany since 2006 and had worked as a doctor.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who was among the group of politicians that laid flowers at a church near the market, said that nearly 40 people were critically injured in Friday’s car-ramming, adding he was “very worried” for them.

“There is no more peaceful, more joyous place in Germany than Christmas markets when people come together ahead of the Christmas festival and spend some time together, drink mulled wine, have a sausage together to relax together,” Scholz told reporters in Magdeburg on Saturday.

He stressed that Germany must remain united after the fatal attack, and vowed that the perpetrator would not go unpunished, adding that investigators would, “try to understand what the motive was of the attacker in order to respond with the full strength of the law.”
Footage from social media, verified by the local media, shows the gruesome moment a black car drove directly into the crowd at the busy Christmas market.

In the footage, dozens of people can be seen crowded at the market stalls when the vehicle plows directly into them. Some people can be seen running away in panic, while others dive into the stalls. Bodies and debris are scattered across the narrow lane as the car turns out of the plaza.

The area around the car was previously cordoned off over suspicion that an explosive device could be inside it, but police later found no such device, local public broadcaster MDR reported, citing Magdeburg police.

The suspect had rented the car used in the alleged attack, MDR reported, citing Haseloff. The state’s interior minister, Tamara Zieschang, said that the suspect had a permanent residency permit.