Berlin terror attack: Twelve dead and 48 injured as truck ploughs into crowd at Christmas market

TEHRAN (Basirat)- Germany was the victim of a suspected mass terror attack on Monday night after a lorry ploughed into a busy Christmas market in Berlin.

Germany was the victim of a suspected mass terror attack on Monday night after a lorry ploughed into a busy Christmas market in Berlin.

At least twelve people were killed and 48 were injured, some seriously, after the vehicle mounted the pavement at about 40mph and crashed into them.

The driver, whose nationality is unknown, was reported to have fled but was later said to have been arrested by police. A passenger in the lorry – which came from Poland and may have been hijacked – was later found dead inside. It is believed he may have been the original driver of the truck. German authorities confirmed that the passenger was a Polish national and that he was not the person in control of the vehicle at the time of the crash.

Police said the incident – which echoed an attack in Nice in July this year where 86 people were killed by a truck driven by a terrorist inspired by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) – appeared to be intentional. On Monday night they warned local residents to stay indoors.

The crash was labelled as an apparent "terrorist attack" by the White House. National Security spokesman Ned Price said the US condemned the events "in the strongest terms".

Officials were said to be investigating the crash as a terrorist act, according to a German intelligence source, CNN reported on Monday night.

Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, expressed her sympathy for the victims of the incident.

Germany was put on high alert for a major terror attack in the months after Mrs Merkel opened the country’s borders to more than one million refugees from the Middle East.

Within minutes of last night’s incident, far-Right politicians were criticised for exploiting the attack to suggest that Germany’s generosity had allowed extremists into the country.

The carnage came just hours after the Russian ambassador to Turkey had been shot dead in the Turkish capital Ankara by a policeman who claimed to be taking revenge for Moscow’s involvement in the battle for Aleppo.

And it followed warnings that Isil terrorists may target Christmas markets in Europe.

Witnesses of the Berlin attack described scenes of panic and horror as a lorry veered off the street and ploughed into the crowded Christmas market just off the famous shopping street of Kurfürstendamm at around 8pm local time (7pm GMT).

Emma Rushton, a tourist, told CNN: "We were enjoying the Christmas lights and mulled wine. We were ready to get up when we heard a loud bang, To our left we saw Christmas lights torn down and the top of an articulated lorry crashing through the stalls and through people.

"We wanted to get out as soon as possible. We wanted to get to a safe place. In my opinion, it was going at 40mph, there was no sign it was slowing down. It did not feel like an accident. There was no way it could have come off like an accident, it was through the middle of the market. The stall where mulled wine was being served was crushed. I saw people bleeding, lying in the pavement.”

Mike Fox, who was visiting Berlin from Birmingham, said the lorry missed him by around three yards.

"It was definitely deliberate,” he said. He added that he helped people who appeared to have broken limbs, and that others were trapped under Christmas stands.

Crushed stalls were left in the remains of the Christmas market last night, in the shadow of the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church, which is preserved in ruins from Second World War bombing.

Other witnesses described bystanders rushing to the aid of the injured in the immediate aftermath of the attack. Many of the injured were said to be in a life-threatening condition last night.

Witnesses described the driver of the lorry as "Eastern European” in appearance.

The truck, which had Polish number plates, belonged to a Polish delivery company.

The company said the vehicle, which was loaded with steel beams, had left Poland for Berlin earlier in the day but that contact with the driver was lost at around 4pm local time (3pm GMT) and the firm believed the lorry may have been hijacked.

Ariel Zurawski, the owner of the vehicle, told Polish television his cousin had initially been driving the truck, but he believed it had been hijacked.

"I can say, hand on heart, that the man who drove into those people in the centre of Berlin was not my driver,” Mr Zurawksi said.

"This is my cousin. I’ve known him since birth. I have faith in him, this is not the man I know, they have done something to him.” He said he believed the dead man found inside the cab of the lorry was his cousin.

Berlin police said they suspected the truck was stolen from a construction site in Poland. There were unconfirmed reports in the German press last night that the alleged truck driver had arrived in the country this year as a refugee from Pakistan.

There has long been concern in Germany that the country’s traditional Christmas markets could be a target for a terror attack. German intelligence picked up several indications of an imminent attack on a market in the days leading up to the attack, according to Die Welt newspaper.

The attack took place at 8pm (7pm GMT) last night, when the market was thronged with Christmas shoppers and people stopping off for a mug of Glühwein or mulled wine on their way home. The Breitscheidplatz market, where the attack took place, is particularly vulnerable as it is situated on a pedestrian island between two busy thoroughfares.

Witnesses said the truck had approached from Budapester Strasse, to the north of the market, before veering into the stalls without slowing.

"With the apparent attack on the Christmas market in Berlin, our worst fears have come true,” Stephan Mayer of Mrs Merkel’s Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU), said.

"Now the security concepts at all the Christmas markets in Germany have to be examined — including the question of whether they can still take place at all.”

Since Nice, security experts have warned that it is largely impossible to protect people against this style of attack, in which a lorry is driven into a crowd.

Attention will now focus on the identity of the perpetrators. Any indication that they may have been asylum-seekers will heap pressure on Mrs Merkel over her controversial "open door” refugee policy, under which more than one million migrants entered Germany last year.

Ariel Zurawski, the owner of the vehicle, told Polish television his cousin had been driving the vehicle, which had stopped off in Berlin on its way back from Italy with a consignment of steel.

Mr Zurawski said the driver’s wife had spoken to him around 4pm, but had been unable to reach him later.

"I can say hand on heart that the man who drove into those people in the centre of Berlin was not my driver,” Mr Zurawksi said.

"This is my cousin. I’ve known him since birth. I have faith in him, this is not the man I know, they have done something to him.”

Mr Zurawski later said he believed the dead man found inside the cab of the lorry was his cousin.

"My wife told me they had found a body in the cab. From what they say it could be my driver. My cousin,” he said. "Please forgive me but I can't talk any more now."

Mrs Merkel has distanced herself from the policy in recent months, and promised it will never be repeated, after her party suffered damaging losses in regional elections and with general elections looming next year.