Chemnitz, Germany // German police on Sunday hunted for a Syrian man suspected of plotting a bomb attack as investigators questioned his flat-mate after finding explosives in their apartment.
The man being questioned, a Syrian who had been detained the previous day, was remanded in custody by a judge on charges he had helped to plan a “serious act of violence”.
Security was stepped up at airports and train stations as it was unclear whether the fugitive, Jaber Albakr, 22, was carrying more bomb-making material or weapons.
“The search for the suspect is under way,” police said on Twitter. “We do not know where he is and what he’s carrying with him. Be careful.”
Albakr had narrowly escaped police commandos at dawn on Saturday as they prepared to arrest him in his flat in the eastern city of Chemnitz.
Officers fired a warning shot when they saw the man leave the communist-era apartment block, but he managed to escape, reported news weekly Spiegel, labelling it “a possible police failure”.
Police said they then found several hundred grams of an “explosive substance more dangerous than TNT” in the flat, adding that “even a small quantity ... could have caused enormous damage”.
Local media reported the material – which a bomb disposal squad destroyed in a controlled blast – was TATP, the homemade explosive known as “mother of Satan” that was used by extremists in the Paris and Brussels attacks.
Albakr may have “an Islamist motive”, police sources on said Saturday. German news agency DPA, said he was believed to have links to ISIL.
Police rounded up three of Albakr’s known associates on Saturday and remanded one in custody on Sunday, while letting the other two go.
“One of those arrested yesterday at Chemnitz railway station is the man renting the apartment that was searched yesterday and where several hundred grams of explosives were found,” said police spokesman Tom Bernhardt.
“An investigation into complicity is ongoing against this compatriot of the suspect ... He has been presented to a judge” to be kept in detention, he said.
Mr Bernhardt added that the search for Albakr has been extended “beyond the borders of Germany”, with police in contact with their counterparts in other EU countries.
Spiegel said Albakr had entered Germany on February 18, 2015 and two weeks later filed a request for asylum, which was granted in June that year.
*Agence France-Presse
