Authorities Detain Islamist After Blast on Team Bus in Germany’s Dortmund Style of attack leaves investigators hesitant to attribute responsibility By Ruth Bender

Posted By on April 13th, 2017

https://www.wsj.com/articles/federal-prosecutor-takes-on-german-blast-probe-indicating-terror-suspicions-1491986861

BERLIN—Authorities detained a suspected Islamist on Wednesday and were investigating another after a bomb blast hit a German soccer team’s bus, leaving one player injured.

The arrest came after investigators found three identical letters near the scene that indicated an Islamist motive, said Frauke Köhler, spokeswoman of the federal prosecutor. Yet the Tuesday night attack in Dortmund bore few of the hallmarks of past Islamist attacks in the country, leaving investigators hesitant to attribute responsibility.

Terror experts said the unusual sophistication of the attack, the preparation it would have required, and the force of the explosives used would mark a significant step up for Islamist militants if they were indeed responsible.

Ms. Köhler didn’t publicly identify the detained suspect or say why the second person hadn’t been arrested. But a person close to the investigation said both were from North-Rhine Westphalia, the western state where Dortmund is located, and that investigators were lacking evidence to arrest the second one.

The attack hit a bus that was ferrying Borussia Dortmund’s soccer players to their stadium for a quarterfinal game in the most prestigious tournament in club soccer.

“It almost looks like a classical improvised explosive device as we see it in Iraq,” said Stefan Hansen, managing director of the Center of Research on Terrorism and Radicalization at the University of Kiel. CONTINUE AT SITE

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