The Japan Times - Urgent search for suspect after deadly 'Islamist terror' attack near Berlin Pride

Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt named the chief suspect as 21-year-old Abdul Ballout, whom German media reported was a supporter of the so-called Islamic State group (IS) with a criminal conviction dating from just this May.

The incident late Saturday shattered what had been a day of celebration for hundreds of thousands attending Christopher Street Day (CSD), one of Europe's largest Pride events.

- How the attack unfolded -

Shortly before 10:00 pm (2000 GMT) on Saturday a white vehicle ran into people on the southern edge of central Berlin's Tiergarten park before crashing into a tree.

Police say that "one or more" people then left the vehicle and fled the scene.

Dobrindt said Ballout was suspected of then using a machete to attack more people.

He said 29 people were hurt, some of them with life-threatening injuries.

The attack took place several hundred metres away from the end of the CSD parade route and the event's main stage at Berlin's iconic Brandenburg Gate.

The vehicle used in the attack, a Citroen minivan with a Berlin number plate, could be seen on Sunday morning still at the scene, heavily damaged by the impact with the tree.

Lines of police officers were combing the ground near the car in the search for clues and taking samples of material from the ground.

Shortly after the attack the festivities were cut short, with revellers requested to leave the area.

- Islamist-linked suspect -

Dobrindt said Ballout, a German citizen with Lebanese roots, had previously been known to the authorities for a "high number" of previous crimes and for being radicalised and that he belonged to the "Islamist scene".

Dobrindt said that Ballout had a criminal conviction and been sentenced to a year and ten months in jail, but that the sentence had been suspended.

"Everything we see here indicates that this was an Islamist terror attack," he said.

German media reported that the conviction for "preparing a serious act of subversive violence" dated from this May and followed a trip Ballout made last year to the Middle East in a failed attempt to join IS.

Police described Ballout as thin, around 1.90 metres (6.2 feet) tall with black hair and dressed in a black hoodie and white trousers.

An AFP reporter saw on Sunday that police had been deployed to the suspect's alleged address, around one kilometre south of the scene of the attack.

Dobrindt said that officers at train stations, airports and Germany's borders had been alerted to be on the lookout for Ballout.

- 'Won't beat us down' -

In a vigil on Sunday afternoon, hundreds of people packed out the square in front of the Brandenburg Gate holding rainbow flags and flowers, with more gathering on the Unter den Linden avenue next to the square.

At the scene of the attack itself people left hand-written messages of condolence and support.

Armin Duenhoelter, 49 from Wolfsburg, who works as a drag artist, was backstage at the main stage when the celebrations were cut short.

He told AFP on Sunday morning that he was still "shocked" by Saturday's events but vowed to be back for next year's CSD "even though in the back of your mind or in your gut you might feel uneasy".

"But we won't let it beat us down," he said.

German politicians were swift to react to the attack, with Berlin's Mayor Kai Wegner condemning a "brutal attack" on "a gathering for a tolerant and peaceful Berlin".

Chancellor Friedrich Merz said in the early hours of Sunday vowed to bring those responsible for the "horrific act" to justice.

President Frank-Walter Steinmeier said he was "shaken and outraged" by the attack.

The flag at the German Bundestag was ordered to be lowered to half mast.

There were also expressions of solidarity from abroad, with European Union chief Ursula von der Leyen expressing "her deepest sympathies" to the victims of the attack.

The governments of other countries, including the Netherlands, France, Italy, Sweden and the UK, also expressed their shock and condemnation.

- Spate of attacks -

Saturday's attack revived memories of a string of similar incidents which have shaken Germany in recent years and inflamed debate on immigration, with several of the perpetrators being from outside Germany.

Martin Hess, a lawmaker from the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) said in a statement that the attack was the result of "a complete failure of the government's security policies".

The deadliest attack in recent years was a truck rampage at a Berlin Christmas market in December 2016 by a Tunisian man with jihadist motives that killed 13 people.

The run-up to last year's general election saw a spate of attacks in public places, including by attackers with Islamist motives.

However, the worst incident in that period saw a Saudi psychiatrist and anti-Islam activist, Taleb Jawad al-Abdulmohsen, kill six people and wound more than 300 in a car-ramming at a busy Christmas market in the eastern city of Magdeburg in 2024.

Y.Kato--JT