Milan police kill suspect in Berlin market attack

An Italian police officer in Milan works at the scene of a shootout early Friday where the suspect in the deadly truck attack on a Berlin market was killed.
An Italian police officer in Milan works at the scene of a shootout early Friday where the suspect in the deadly truck attack on a Berlin market was killed.

MILAN -- The Tunisian man suspected in a deadly attack on a Christmas market in Berlin was killed early Friday in a shootout with police in Milan during a routine patrol outside a train station, ending a Europe-wide manhunt.

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AP/German Federal Police

The wanted photo issued by German federal police on Wednesday, Dec. 21, 2016 shows 24-year-old Tunisian Anis Amri who is suspected of being involved in the fatal attack on the Christmas market in Berlin on Dec. 19, 2016.

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AP

Antonio de Iesu (left) Milan’s chief of police, said Friday that Berlin truck attacker Anis Amri “was a ghost” to authorities, with no identification or phone, who was caught because of basic police work, beefed-up surveillance and “a little luck.”

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AP

Forensic investigators collect evidence Friday near a train station in Milan where Anis Amri was killed in a shootout with police.

Anis Amri traveled from Germany through France and into Italy after Monday night's truck attack in Berlin, at least some of it by train, Italian police said. French officials refused to comment on his passage through France, which has increased surveillance on trains after recent French attacks and the one in Germany.

Italian Premier Paolo Gentiloni praised the two police officers for their courage in taking down Amri during a check of ID papers while he was alone outside the deserted station. But he also called for greater cross-border police cooperation, suggesting some dismay that Europe's open-border policy had enabled Amri to move around easily despite being Europe's No. 1 fugitive.

Amri, who shot one of the police officers in the shoulder, was identified by fingerprints supplied by Germany.

"The person killed, without a shadow of a doubt, is Anis Amri, the suspect of the Berlin terrorist attack," said Italian Interior Minister Marco Minniti.

The Islamic State extremist group claimed responsibility for the attack outside Berlin's Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church in which a truck plowed into a Christmas market, killing 12 people and injuring 56. It also noted Amri's death in Milan and released a video showing him pledging allegiance to the militant group.

Amri has been linked to an extremist recruitment network allegedly run by Ahmad Abdulaziz Abdullah A., also known as Abu Walaa, a Germany-based preacher who was arrested last month, said Holger Muench, head of the Federal Criminal Police Office.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel ordered an investigation into all angles of the case after it emerged that German authorities had tracked Amri for months on suspicion of planning an attack.

"We can be relieved at the end of this week that one acute danger has been ended," she said in Berlin. "But the danger of terrorism as a whole remains, as it has for many years -- we all know that."

She added that "the Amri case raises a number of questions. ... We will now press ahead and look into how far state measures need to be changed."

Milan, Rome and other cities have been on heightened alert, with increased surveillance and police patrols. Italian officials stressed that the officers who stopped Amri didn't suspect he was the Berlin attacker but rather grew suspicious because he was a North African man, alone outside a deserted train station at 3 a.m.

Amri, 24, who had spent time in prison in Italy, was stopped during a patrol in Milan's Sesto San Giovanni suburb. He pulled a gun from his backpack after being asked to show his ID and was killed in an ensuing shootout.

Officer Christian Movio, 35, was shot in the right shoulder and had surgery for what doctors said was a superficial wound. His 29-year-old partner, Luca Scata, fatally shot Amri in the chest.

Amri had no ID or phone, carrying only a pocketknife and the .22-caliber pistol he used to shoot Movio, police said.

"He was a ghost," Milan Police Chief Antonio de Iesu said, adding that Amri was stopped because of basic police work, intensified surveillance "and a little luck."

Despite Amri's death, German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said the terrorist threat to the country "remains high" and security won't be scaled down.

Hours after the shootout, the Islamic State's Aamaq news agency released a video of Amri that was filmed only 1½ miles from the German Chancellery in Berlin. He called on Muslims in Europe to rise up and strike at "crusaders."

"God willing, we will slaughter you like pigs," he said in the video, whose date was not given but looked as if it was filmed under wintry skies. The video was evidently filmed in the Moabit district of northern Berlin, on the Kieler bridge.

He added: "To my brothers everywhere, fight for the sake of Allah. Protect our religion. Everyone can do this in their own way. People who can fight should fight, even in Europe."

The Islamic State called Amri "a soldier" in the video, in which Amri also proclaimed loyalty to the Islamic Sate leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

The authenticity of the video could not be independently confirmed, but previous material released by Aamaq has been credible. Earlier, a statement carried on Aamaq described Amri as inspired by the Islamic State.

Suspect's Route

Amri passed through France before arriving by train at Milan's central station, where video surveillance showed him about 1 a.m. Friday, de Iesu said. A ticket indicated he traveled from Chambery, France, through Turin and into Milan, an Italian anti-terrorism official said.

De Iesu declined to provide further information. Germany's chief federal prosecutor, Peter Frank, said his office contacted Italian authorities to establish Amri's route.

A Milan anti-terrorism official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk publicly about the investigation, said Amri made his way to the piazza outside the Sesto San Giovanni train station nearly 5 miles from the main station.

Authorities are still trying to determine how Amri got to the piazza because only a few buses operate at that hour.

"It is now of great significance for us to establish whether the suspect had a network of supporters or helpers in preparing and carrying out the crime, and in fleeing, whether there were accessories or helpers," Frank said.

Prosecutors also want to know whether Amri's gun was the same one used to shoot the Polish driver of the truck he had commandeered for the attack, Frank added. The driver was found dead in the vehicle's cab.

De Iesu confirmed that the truck's cargo was loaded Dec. 16 in another Milan suburb, Cinisello Balsamo, before heading to Berlin, but said there was no evidence to connect it to Amri's presence nearby early Friday.

The Milan anti-terrorism official said investigators want to see whether Amri had any contacts in Milan. There is no evidence he passed through Milan in his previous stay in Italy, after he left Tunisia after the 2011 Arab Spring.

Muench of the German Federal Criminal Police Office said Amri's name "has come up" in connection with the network centering on Abu Walaa, Muench said. Abu Walaa was arrested Nov. 8 with four other men and accused of leading a group whose aim was to steer people to the Islamic State in Syria. Prosecutors say the network smuggled at least one young man and his family to Syria.

Family Grieves

Amri's brother Abdelkader said the family wants to learn the "truth about my brother" but refused to comment on his death.

Walid Amri, another brother, sounded distressed and was struggling to speak over the phone. Women were heard crying in the background.

"This is a very difficult time for the entire family," he said, before his voice broke.

His family, which lives in the central Tunisian town of Oueslatia, wants his remains sent home from Italy. Tunisian Foreign Ministry spokesman Bouraoui Limam said it would "take a while" for the body to be repatriated because Italian, German and Tunisian investigators need to carry out their examinations.

Amri served 3½ years in jail in Italy for setting a fire at a refugee center and making threats, among other things, but authorities apparently detected no signs he was becoming radicalized. He was transferred repeatedly among Sicilian prisons for bad conduct, with records saying he bullied inmates and tried to spark insurrections.

His mother said he went from there to Switzerland and then to Germany last year.

German authorities deemed him a potential threat long before the Berlin attack and even kept him under covert surveillance for six months this year.

They had been trying to deport him after his asylum application was rejected in July but were unable to do so because he lacked valid identity papers and Tunisia initially denied he was a citizen. Authorities said he has used at least six different names and three nationalities.

Merkel said she told Tunisian President Beji Caid Essebsi the repatriation of Tunisians who aren't entitled to residency in Germany needs to be stepped up. Essebsi called for tighter cooperation to fight "the plague of terrorism that threatens the security and stability of all countries and all societies."

Tunisian authorities have insisted the reason it took so long to issue Amri's papers is that they needed to verify his identity, noting his numerous aliases.

Information for this article was contributed by Colleen Barry, Nicole Winfield, Frank Jordans, Geir Moulson and Bouazza ben Bouazza of The Associated Press; by Anthony Faiola, Souad Mekhennet and Stefano Pitrelli, Stephanie Kirchner and Naveena Kottoor of The Washington Post; by Elisabetta Povoledo, Gaia Pianigiani, Franziska Reymann and staff members of The New York Times.

A Section on 12/24/2016

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