Saudi Man Arrested After Car Attack At Christmas Market In Germany

A Saudi man has been arrested after a car ramming attack on a Christmas market on Friday in the eastern German city of Magdeburg, the state premier said.

“We have arrested the perpetrator, it is a man from Saudi Arabia,” state premier of Saxony-Anhalt Reiner Haseloff told reporters at the scene.

The suspect was “a doctor who has been in Germany since 2006”, Haseloff said.

Authorities were “in the process of gathering all further data and also conducting an interrogation”, he said.

“From what we currently know, he was a lone attacker, so we don’t think there is any further danger for the city.”

The suspect was 50 years old, Saxony-Anhalt’s regional interior minister Tamara Zieschang said alongside Haseloff.

The man from Saudi Arabia lived in Bernburg, some 40 kilometres (24 miles) south of Magdeburg, and had “a permanent residence permit”, Zieschang said.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz would visit the scene on Saturday, Haseloff said.

Haseloff said he and Scholz would discuss the “necessary measures” to be taken next.

“We now need to work through this and draw long-term consequences,” Haseloff said.

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