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Updated 8.20pm
THE SO-CALLED Islamic State group has claimed responsibility for a fatal attack on a Christmas market in Berlin.
Yesterday a lorry ploughed into the market, killing 12 people.
Through its Amaq news agency, the terrorist group called the attacker a “soldier of the Islamic State”.
Earlier, the Pakistani asylum seeker arrested after the attack was released due to lack of evidence.
“The accused, detained over the attack on the Berlin Christmas market on 19 December, 2016, was let go on this evening on the orders of the federal prosecutor,” authorities said in a statement.
The forensic tests carried out so far did not provide evidence of the accused’s presence during the crimes in the cab of the lorry.
As the shellshocked German capital reeled from the country’s deadliest attack of recent years earlier today, doubts emerged over whether the man detained overnight actually committed the atrocity.
Berlin’s police chief, Klaus Kandt, had said “we may have a dangerous criminal in the area”, and announced that security would be boosted while urging “heightened vigilance”.
German newspaper Die Welt first reported from police sources that the culprit may still at large and is armed and dangerous.
“We have the wrong man,” Berlin police are quoted as saying by the newspaper.
Twelve people were killed and almost 50 wounded when the truck tore through the crowd yesterday evening, smashing wooden stalls and crushing victims, in scenes reminiscent of July’s deadly attack in the French Riviera city of Nice.
Speaking earlier today, Germany’s Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere told journalists the arrested man had “denied the act”.
De Maiziere confirmed that the detained man arrived in Germany on 31 December 2015, seeking asylum.
Despite the blow to the investigation, De Maiziere said: “We have no doubt that this terrible event was an attack.”
Angela Merkel
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said ”according to what we know, we have to assume this was a terrorist attack.”
Merkel, visibly moved and dressed in black, told reporters:
I know it will be especially hard for us to take if it is confirmed that the person who committed this attack sought protection and asylum in Germany.
Before that revelation that the man arrested did not carry out the attack, Merkel had said that if the attack was carried out by an asylum seeker it would be “particularly sickening in relation to the many, many Germans who are involved every day in helping refugees”.
She added it would also be repugnant “toward the many people who need our protection every day and who are working on integration in our country”.
Merkel said she personally was “horrified, shocked and deeply saddened” by the attack and would visit the site later today with the interior minister, Thomas de Maiziere, and Berlin Mayor Michael Mueller.
She pledged that German authorities would “get to the bottom” of the assault and that it would be “punished with the full force of our law”.
The arrival of 890,000 asylum seekers last year has polarised Germany, with critics calling the influx a serious security threat. Another 300,000 people have arrived this year.
Investigation
An MP for Germany’s CDU Party and a member of the German Parliament Foreign Affairs committee Roderich Kiesewetter said nobody has taken responsibility for the attack yet, but as far as German intelligence is aware, there is an Islamist background to it.
In a Twitter message the police service said it was carefully investigating the “probable terrorist attack” in which a truck was driven “intentionally” into a crowd killing 12 people and wounding dozens more yesterday evening.
“Our investigators assume that the truck was intentionally steered into the crowd at the Christmas market,” the police said in a Twitter message about the suspected attack late last night.
The Polish-registered vehicle, which was loaded with steel beams, had cut a bloody swathe of 60-80 metres into the market in the once-divided city’s inner west.
At least six of those killed were German citizens, authorities said, while countries from Israel to Spain said their nationals were among those injured in the busy tourist spot.
A Polish man, killed with an gunshot, was found on the truck’s passenger seat, said de Maiziere. He was believed to be the vehicle’s registered driver.
A German newspaper is reporting that the now released suspect was arrested with the help of a witness who followed the man after he fled the scene on foot.
The Die Welt daily said that a bystander said they saw the man jump out of the cab of the lorry after it had ploughed through the crowd.
The anonymous witness then trailed the suspect for about two kilometres, while staying on the phone with police to keep them informed of his location, according to the report.
‘Blood and bodies everywhere’
Ambulances and heavily armed police rushed to the area after the vehicle mounted the pavement of the market in a square popular with tourists, in horrific scenes reminiscent of July’s deadly truck attack in the French Riviera city of Nice.
Australian Trisha O’Neill told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation she was only metres from where the truck smashed into the crowded market:
I just saw this huge black truck speeding through the markets crushing so many people and then all the lights went out and everything was destroyed.
I could hear screaming and then we all froze. Then suddenly people started to move and lift all the wreckage off people, trying to help whoever was there.
O’Neill said there was “blood and bodies everywhere”.
Irish reaction
Taoiseach Enda Kenny last night condemned the attack as a “barbaric attack” and extended his condolences to the families of those killed.
“Our thoughts are with those injured and their families. Any Irish citizens with concerns should phone 00353 1 4082000,” he said.
With separate terror incidents occurring yesterday in Ankara, Turkey, and Zurich, Switzerland, Kenny added his condemnation for those attacks also.
“I condemn the callous murder of Russia’s Ambassador to Turkey and offer condolences to Ambassador Karlov’s family,” Kenny said.
I condemn the cowardly attack on worshippers at prayer in Zurich this evening. These acts of violence have no place in society and constitute an attack on our fundamental values.
A statement from President Michael D Higgins also offered condolences to the victims of all three attacks:
As President of Ireland I wish to convey my condolences to the families of the victims of these acts and the solidarity of the people of Ireland with all those affected by the violence. I wish all the survivors and their communities strength and confidence in these difficult times.
Separately, Minister for Foreign Affairs Charlie Flanagan described himself as “horrified by the loss of life” seen in Berlin.
“Ireland stands in solidarity with Germany,” Flanagan said.
Speaking about the Berlin attack, Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald said that it was an attack “on freedom itself”.
“This appears to have been an attack not just on people innocently going about their business preparing for Christmas, but on freedom itself,” she said.
Our values of democracy and liberty are the target of those who wish to see a world of dark tyranny imposed on us all.
‘Safer than Paris’
Traditional Christmas markets are popular in cities and towns throughout Germany and have frequently been mentioned by security services as potentially vulnerable to attacks.
“It’s awful. We were in Berlin for Christmas,” American tourist Kathy Forbes said. “We also thought it would be safer than Paris.”
The crash happened in the shadow of the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church whose damage in a World War II bombing raid has been preserved as a reminder of the horrors of war for future generations.
The square is at the end of the Kurfuerstendamm boulevard, which was packed with holiday shoppers.
Police said the truck made it as far as 80 metres into the Christmas market before it came to a halt.
High alert
Europe has been on high alert for most of 2016, with terror attacks striking Paris and Brussels, while Germany has been hit by several assaults claimed by the Islamic State group and carried out by asylum seekers.
An axe rampage on a train in the southern state of Bavaria in July wounded five people, and a suicide bombing left 15 people injured in the same state six days later.
In another case, a 16-year-old German-Moroccan girl in February stabbed a police officer in the neck with a kitchen knife, wounding him badly, allegedly on IS orders.
The attack in Berlin comes five months after Tunisian extremist Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel ploughed a truck into a crowd on the Nice seafront, killing 86 people.
In response to the suspected attack in Berlin, France beefed up security at its own Christmas markets.
“The French share in the mourning of the Germans in the face of this tragedy that has hit all of Europe,” President Francois Hollande said.
The Nice bloodshed – as people were watching a fireworks display on the Bastille Day holiday on 14 July – further traumatised a France already reeling from a series of jihadist attacks.
The United States labelled yesterday’s incident an apparent “terrorist attack” and pledged its support.
President-elect Donald Trump blamed “Islamist terrorists” for a “slaughter” of Christians in the German capital.
Additional reporting by Cianan Brennan, Cliódhna Russell, Rónán Duffy and Órla Ryan
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She could have offered to go into Govt to influence policy but chose not to along with many others who have zero intention of ever being in Govt cos they would lose their seats nxt election.
Boxer Moran did it, got a lot for Athlone but still paid the price. Easier hurl from the ditch.t
@James Gorman: Bríd prefers to jump on passing bandwagons. I have seen her interviewed on various TV shows and is always shown up for it… The funniest being the time she was on protesting the Trump visit (his human rights violations), when asked if she felt the same about the official Chinese government visit… She was not aware they had visited.
@James Gorman: The only thing that Independents or snaller parties have to offer the electorate is, acting as opposition to the government of the day and raising all the issues that it would rather not see the light of day.
When independents go into government with FF or FG it inevitably leads to a parish pump payout for their support, which might be great for their constituency, but it doesn’t serve the national interest or address bigger issues such as climate change or other international issues.
The FFG response to climate report is to increase Carbon tax… nothing to do with climate change.. all to do with creating another tax to pay the more than 200 billion euro debt that have accumulated… well done lads…
@John Bathe: Carbon taxes change habits. What’s your solution?
@John Bathe: give us your solution to it then.
@John Bathe: what are you solutions and who is going to pay for it
@Mickety Dee: no they dont. not when affordable solutions dont exist.
@Frankie J: Until our “leaders” (or whatever they call themselves) get their act together and start taking this serious, then it is pointless paying more carbon taxes. From the Irish Independent in Oct 2020.
“Ireland has to pay €50m to other EU countries after missing a renewable energy target.
The money will have to be paid in the next two months in exchange for help from countries that have exceeded their own targets and have surplus credits to sell.
That’s on top of an estimated €100m already squirrelled away to pay for missing a key carbon reduction target.”
The taxes will go towards paying those fines. We are not solving anything by doing that! Increases taxes to pay fines because as a country we can’t implement proper plans.
A pure waste of money and time.
@Mickety Dee: “Carbon taxes change habits”
That’s the theory and I expect you’re right to a degree but all we know for sure is that carbon taxes primarily hurt the poor and low wage earners.
@Mickety Dee: nuclear power…. we cant keep burning fossil fuel…
@Frankie J: thoroum molten salt nuclear reactor
@Patrick O Connell: thorium molten salt nuclear reactor.. us and the EU…money better soent than on “carbonn” taxes..
@Frankie J: also do ypu really think FFG are using carbon taxes for projects to alleviate climate change? Like fun they are.
@Patrick O Connell: also do ypu really think FFG are using carbon taxes for projects to alleviate climate change? Like fun they are.
@Will: There would be no wind generation in this island without carbon taxes and subsidies. Both strategies make uneconomic green options become economic
@Mickety Dee: wind is excellent power source.. but what happens on a calm day ??
@John Bathe: The excesd wind energy can be stored in pumped hydro stations. The trouble is that they are hugely expensive to build. We only have one in this country at Turlough Hill in Wicklow but would need several to be able to rely on renewables only. Until then, we’ve no choice but to use some fossil fuel based generation plants.
@Mickety Dee: can’t change the cold damp winters and the need for heating a home ,retro fit I hear you say 20or30 grand never get your money back and most people got fleeced with their mortgages and wouldn’t have to throw around any more ,what if all the new residents coming from all the warmer countries stayed at home there would be global savings on heating fuels there for a start ,etc
@Mickety Dee: No they don’t. They make people poorer and more angrier at being penalised for government inaction.
@Mickety Dee: if they did then ireland with the amongst highest fuel prices and highest alcohol prices would be among the lowest consumers of these products in Europe. Can you explain why that’s not the case?
@Gerard Heery: Installing interior insulation boards can be fitted by most competent DIYers, not a huge expense if done in a piecemeal fashion. Start with the rooms you use the most. The difference is unbelievable. Also double up on Attic insulation.
@Mickety Dee: just so that you know troII , people are already paying taxes on their energy bills. It is going to be tax on a top of tax.
We are also being taxed massively on fuel , on owning a property , on owning a vehicle , on owning a tv , on sugar , on tobacco , on e-cig , on groceries , on everything you can imagine other than water that got stealth taxed somewhere else. Stop troIIing , nobody is buying it.
@John Bathe: If they build the Wind Terbines off the coast like so many other EU countries have done, calm days will still have breeze off the coast
@Mickety Dee: no they don’t education does
@John Bathe: I wholeheartedly agree with the likes of a thorium reactor or Nuclear power being invested in, I also think that if they are going to collect these contentious carbon taxes then they should be used to start a nationwide program to upgrade houses insulation to a higher BER standard and start retrofitting homes with solar panels this would be a useful use of these taxes. They also should also scale up the charging network for BEVs.
@Mickety Dee: how’s that sugar tax working out?
@John Bathe: Turlough Hill. Off-peak surplus used to store water. No toxic waste involved.
@Alan Biddulph: windows and doors is where most of the heat is lost and they don’t come cheap
@Mickety Dee: I didn’t realise heating my home and commuting to my job 1.5 hours away with zero viable public transport options in the only car I can afford (so not a hybrid) was a “habit”. God, you’re right I should just stop.
“politicians 24 hours to react to the IPCC report is telling.”
Hate to speak up on behalf of the guvmint but maybe said politicians decided to read the report before reacting to it. It’s thousands of pages isn’t it? Even the summary must be a long read.
@Will: yes! Over 8000 I believe I read somewhere. Now unless they got a summary with key points or an audiobook they could listen to on the go… I would love to see anyone get thru many pages and be able to give an educated opinion on the contents of what they just read in that from my experience a very short time. Heck it took me weeks to get through The LOTR trilogy and I enjoyed that series the book rarely out of hand!
@Will: Get 10 civil servants to take 800 pages each, read it and summarize the key points. Then everyone meet to discuss. It’s not that difficult.
@Will: that Smith TD a typical left politician, make plenty of empty vessel noise to the uneducated to ensure a safe return to her big salary at the tax payers expense ,but of course no logical or practicable solution to any pressing issue facing our country. Why do we vote for these type of people.
@David Corrigan: nonsense.
@David Corrigan: lol. Sure that’s not that expensive at all. Jesus, you are a genius
@john gavin: They can read, right?
@Peter Roche: We have politicians with advisors and secretaries etc. What do they do? The public service has thousands of people working for them. Summarizing a document isn’t that difficult.
Sorry Brid. As a person who works in the renewable energy game your ideas are the same as everyone else and don’t focus on the low hanging fruit..think about the following
Irish cement are 8% of our emissions, Co2 capture and storage is a must here.
Biomethane plants required at scale to utilise foodwaste and animal slurry to create renewable gas, this will greatly and quickly reduce the agricultural emissions
All heavy good vehicles can easily, more cost effective and lower emitting should be on natural gas, then as the renewable gas comes available, you cannot electrify big trucks.
Have a Co2 footprint label on every product made, so the consumers can pick products with the lowest footprint, that would change the industries to product at lowest co2 cost
It seems everything is centralised around cities(mostly Dublin). Many jobs are based in Dublin and a large amount of commuters are from outside Dublin. Once you leave Dublin however, public transport options for commuters drops significantly, and most rely on their cars, and there is little incentive to not use a car, yet these private motor owners get punished for driving into the city. Its not always the cost thats a factor to commuters to shun the public transport that is there(train from Newbridge to city for example), its state of fact that there isn’t public transport where they live.
With that, I think its funny that their is a lovely train line between Howth to Killiney, and a dedicated cycle lane from Howth to the city, and these routes to the city are serviced by bus routes.
@neuromancer: Completely agree on the massive lack of national public transport in Ireland.
On the DART, though, yes, there is a coastal railway line. Be careful what you wish for – currently it’s just above sea level, for most of the year. I used to commute to work along that line and the waves were over the sea wall in winter. Nevertheless, all those trains kept running in heavy snow, while the Dublin Buses were obliged to pull in and park on the roadsides for the best part of a week.
This lady is an alien. She lives on a near by planet called Ireland. The report in question is to do with climatic issues on Planet Earth.
On planet Ireland, the wind blows constantly, 24/7/365, not for 50% of the time like on Earth. Every Kw of wind or solar has to have full, fast backup, and that means gas. It is is the duplication of systems, plus all the soft subsidies we pay for wind power, that make our electricity the most expensive in Europe.
Her other solution is excellent. Ban the data centres off Planet Ireland. Revert to seventies technology.
The other favourite, killing off half our cows, is again crazy. Leading climate scientists like Alan Savory will explain how vast herds of ruminants seasonally marching up and down the continental grasslands, were precisely the reason why our CO2 levels were much lower and desert areas much smaller in the past.
In reality, we are going nowhere on this until there is an acceptance of a mass worldwide adoption of Gen 4 modular, molten salt nuclear power. Invented back in the fifties, it unfortunately had two mega negatives. No good for bomb making and would have put the coal miners out of business. Moltex just approved in Canada is one example.
@Nicholas Grubb: Canada is also investing heavily in LNG with contracts of up to 40 years.
https://www.nrcan.gc.ca/our-natural-resources/energy-sources-distribution/clean-fossil-fuels/natural-gas/canadian-lng-projects/5683
Why are they doing this in parallel if Moltex is the answer? Genuine question, would be interested to hear. I’ll probably look it up anyway out of interest
@HectorPickaxe:
The US have invested 200 bn. in wind. Likewise the Germans. You thus need a very large supply readily available of gas for the quick fill in of base load. In the case of the US, a lot will come from Canada and in the case of Germany, the Nordstream from Russia. Great energy security there.
The Moltex (TCD ceo. ), is very interesting, because it is designed to heat up a whole lot more salt, which can then be used to help fill the gaps in the wind. The problem is, wind gaps can be six weeks, not just six hours. Remember 2010/2011, mid November to Stephen’s Day.
We need a couple in each of the peat stations. Then the data centres, each using three times the output of the Shannon Scheme. Then all the waste heat to the 24/7/365 grow house. Then the fly farms and the fish and the fowl, before using the rest of the bog for sequestration.
@Nicholas Grubb: Thanks Nicholas, interesting stuff
Presumably Citizen Smith is incapable of appreciating that, even if Ireland reduced its national carbon footprint to zero, it wouldn’t make a blind bit of difference to global warming. But, always the opportunist, she’s probably hoping that this essay will gain her a few extra votes from the Greta Thunderburger fan club (assuming that some of them are old enough to vote.) .
“Moving forward
As part of such a strategy we will need:
To create a State-led, controlled and delivered Renewable Energy company that can produce renewable energy on scale and on time (similar to the ESB in the past)
Massive investment in public transport that can deliver publicly controlled free, frequent public transport throughout the country and in all cities and towns
End the extraction of all fossil fuels and ban existing as well as future licensing
Place a legal ban on the importation of fracked gas and the establishment of LNG terminals
Change planning laws to stop the proliferation of data centres
Create Green New Jobs in retrofitting homes and public buildings, in health, education, public transport and renewing the natural environment.”
This sounds very expensive, it would be good to know if this will reduce global emissions by how many percentage points? 10? 20? 30? 60? What, you mean you don’t know? You mean it’s true that doing all this would likely only reduce global emissions by a fraction of a fraction of a percent?
Yeah, more looney left latte sipping green ideology. No practical real world thinking, all purple unicorns and sound bites to make them feel better about themselves looking down from their high unicorns
And in the naked light, I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never share
And no one dared
Disturb the sound of silence
@Modern Irish Dad: https://youtu.be/NAEppFUWLfc
@Modern Irish Dad: That’s certainly an FFG statement. Sound of silence very apt for them.
I am not denying climate change and it’s effects on the planet but I’m just wondering if the fact that these “natural disasters” are now always being reported in the medias might make things look far worse than they actually are??
@Frédéric Slimane: dont forget people deliberately starting fires. greece is notorious as you burn a piece of land and get planning where you wouldnt before because it’s now scrub.
this the gets out of hand.
the other thing people like living in the woods.
We’ve all read the statistics and when burnt acres become burnt hectares, it does seem worthwhile for countries afflicted to ask for international help.
I do not like Martin and I’d be one of the last to defend him, but I have to say this:
Lamenting about a 24h delayed reaction to a report dealing with a decades long issue (itself among hundreds of other reports, memos, analyses, and forecasts through the years) it’s political posturing & sharpshooting of the lowest kind.
It’s sad when people spend so much time and effort in an attempt to wave red herrings in our face. Honestly I thought Irish media cannot go lower than it did when covering the pandemic response. I was wrong, it went off the rails in the last 3-4 days.
It seems that the government solution is to tax the sh….out of us via Carbon Tax but that is not the solution. Watch what happens in the October Budget. Real and Meaningful solutions please. Taxes won’t buy us out of this. It needs a real conversion.
No one wants to go backwards.
There are science and engineering based solutions which require investment now (and without the necessity of short term profits.)
Nuclear fusion is getting much closer,
huge untapped potential in tidal power and hydropower
Some new prototype solar cells getting close to 40% efficiency
but probably the most important will be a world wide power grid,
If the alternative is moving to major urban centers like Dublin or giving up personal freedoms, the investment seems a small price to pay
have your say