Bavaria’s Interior Minister has blamed the presence of an Islamist terrorist cell in Germany on Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Joachim Hermann of Merkel’s Bavarian sister party CSU, told newsmen that Merkel’s open-door refugee policy has made three Islamic State suspects to pose as asylum seekers in the country.
“The glaring security gaps in controlling the massive influx of refugees, especially during the fall of 2015, are exacting revenge.
“We know now that Islamic State exploited these vulnerabilities to smuggle attackers to Europe by disguising them as refugees,’’ Hermann said, whose southern German state fell victim to two terrorist attacks in July.
According to security reports, both were carried out by asylum seekers.
The federal prosecutor’s office in Karlsruhe said that the news came a day after three Syrian men aged 17, 18 and 26 were arrested in refugee homes for coming to Germany.
The office added that their coming was to “either execute an existing mission or to stand ready for further instructions” from Islamic State.
It noted that all three men were expected to be remanded in custody.
The CSU’s Hermann is one of a slew of critics of Merkel’s decision in 2015 to suspend the vetting of Syrians fleeing the country’s long-running civil war.
They added that Merkel’s decision had thereby allowed hundreds of thousands of refugees to enter the country in the last four months of 2015.
Merkel has repeatedly emphasised the fact that crimes by a small number of individuals posing as asylum seekers should not lead to blanket suspicion of or discrimination against those legitimately seeking refuge in Germany. (dpa/NAN)
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