Suspected perpetrator of attack in Germany surrenders to police

The alleged perpetrator of the stabbing attack that left three dead in Solingen, Germany, claimed by the Islamic State, has surrendered to police.

“A 26-year-old man surrendered to the authorities conducting the investigation and claimed responsibility for the attack. He was provisionally detained. His participation in the events is currently being intensively investigated,” police said.

The interior minister of the North Rhine-Westphalia region, Herbert Reul, has confirmed that this is “the man we have actually been looking for all day” and that he is “highly suspicious”. According to Reul, evidence has been found that would confirm his authorship.

The Public Prosecutor’s Office is investigating this person on suspicion of committing a triple murder, multiple attempted murders and possible membership of the jihadist organization. He will be transferred to the city of Karlsruhe to appear before the judge of the Federal Court of Justice, who will decide whether he will be placed in preventive detention.

The detainee, 26, is a Syrian national who had been granted a subsidiary protection residence permit in Germany in 2022. At the time of his arrest, his clothes were still stained with blood, as he was believed to have been in hiding.

There were two arrests on Saturday; the first concerns a minor under the age of 15 who is suspected of having knowledge of the attacker’s plans.

The attack

Friday around 9:45pm a man started stabbing people indiscriminately in Fronhofa market in the city centre where a stage was set up for the commemorative events for 650 years of SolingenHe managed to escape by taking advantage of the chaos, leaving in his wake three dead and eight wounded, four of them in critical condition.

The attack came days after Interior Minister Nancy Faeser announced plans to restrict the carrying of long knives in public. According to police statistics, 9,000 cases of knife injuries were recorded in Germany last year.