Autor:
On Monday, Riaz Khan Ahmadzai, a 17-year-old refugee living with a foster family in Germany, perpetrated an attack on a regional train near Würzburg using an axe and a knife. Ahmadzai attacked a group of five travelers from Hong Kong, leaving five wounded, two critically. Police shot and killed the teen on the scene. Evidence found after the attack suggests it may have been motivated by Islamist hatred. Ahmadzai, a devout Sunni, left behind a handwritten document, several pages long, which investigators believe to be a goodbye letter to his father. In it, he complains about infidels and says he will take revenge on them. "Please pray that I go to heaven," he is said to have written.
Although it has not been determined if the young man had connections to the Islamic State, he did leave behind a video in which he claimed responsibility for the attack and affiliation with the group. "In the name of God, I am a soldier of IS and am beginning a holy operation in Germany," he says. "You can see that I lived in your country and in your house. With God I have created this plan in your own house, and with God's will, I will slaughter you in your own home."
Investigators are currently pursuing leads suggesting Ahmadzai may have had links to the terrorist scene.
SPIEGEL spoke with German Interior Minister Thomas de Maizière about the general threat of terrorism in the country and whether the government's refugee policies have made Germany a more dangerous place.
The article's full-text is available here.
