On December 31, three people suspected of wanting to carry out a terrorist attack against Cologne Cathedral in Germany were arrested. The intelligence official assures that the risk of terrorist attacks is “real and higher than it has been for a long time”.
The terrorist threat looms over Europe. On Sunday, December 31, three suspected Islamist individuals were arrested for wanting to commit an attack on New Year’s Eve against the Cologne Cathedral in Germany using “a car.” Faced with the high alert level, a thousand law enforcement officers were mobilized around the religious building and the underground parking lot of Cologne Cathedral was inspected using explosive detection dogs. Fortunately, no threats were detected. According to initial information, the suspects are part of “groups of Islamist people” who “at the moment are more active than usual”, revealed the regional Minister of the Interior, Herbert Reul, during a conference Press.
Other plans for attacks in Europe
A few days before Christmas , another suspect, a 25-year-old Tajik, had already been arrested for the same reasons. These individuals are mainly all from Tajikistan, and members of a network operating on behalf of the Islamic State-Khorasan, a regional branch of IS particularly active in Afghanistan.
The risk of terrorist attacks is “real and higher than it has been for a long time”, declared the head of German domestic intelligence at the end of November, especially since the Hamas attacks against Israel on October 7. The terrorist threat was all the more serious as this network of Islamists planned to attack in several European countries, notably in Austria (Vienna) and Spain (Madrid). In 2016, Germany suffered an Islamist truck attack on a Christmas market in Berlin that killed 12 people.
