\n<\/p>\n
Five men have been detained on suspicion of planning an attack on a Christmas market in southern Germany, the public prosecutor in Munich said on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Formal arrest warrants were issued for four of the men, while one was taken into preventive custody for the suspected plans to attack a Christmas market in the Dingolfing area in the south of the state of Bavaria, the prosecutor said.<\/p>\n
Prosecutors currently suspect an Islamist motivation for the attack, possibly to be carried out using a vehicle.<\/p>\n
The public prosecutor’s office stressed the presumption of innocence on Saturday evening.<\/p>\n
The mass-circulation Bild newspaper had earlier reported on the case.<\/p>\n
The arrests are believed to have taken place on Friday, and the men were then brought before the magistrate on Saturday.<\/p>\n
According to the public prosecutor’s office, the men are a 56-year-old Egyptian, a 37-year-old Syrian and three Moroccans aged 22, 28 and 30. According to the preliminary state of investigations, the Egyptian is said to have called for an attack in a mosque in the Dingolfing-Landau area.<\/p>\n
When the attack was supposed to take place or how concrete the plans were, was initially unclear.<\/p>\n
Bavarian Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann told Bild: “Thanks to the excellent cooperation of our security authorities, several suspects could be arrested in a very short time, thereby preventing a potentially Islamist-motivated attack in Bavaria.”<\/p>\n
He added that the background to this must now be clarified.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n