A 12-year-old German-Iraqi boy tried to blow up a nail bomb at a Christmas market in the western town of Ludwigshafen under direction from Islamic State, it was reported today.
The boy, born in the town in 2004, was “strongly religiously radicalised” and apparently made the device himself and concealed it in a backpack, Focus magazine said. He apparently retrieved the bag after it failed to detonate and nine days later on December 5 he placed it in a bush outside the town hall in Ludwigshafen where it was spotted by a passer-by.
The police closed the area to the public while bomb disposal officers defused the device, which was later found to be incapable of exploding, the report said.
Officers were able to trace and arrest the boy quickly, Focus reported, without giving further details. He was handed over to the youth authorities with the consent of his parents. He is too young to be prosecuted and is being held in a youth detention centre while the authorities decide with his family what to do with him.
The boy came to the attention of the authorities this summer when he was prevented from leaving for Syria to join Isis, the magazine reported. He was detained and placed in a youth centre.
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Inside the backpack was a glass jar with a hole in the top of the lid and a wire protruding. The jar was filled with a powdered explosive, which analysis later showed had been gathered from fireworks and sparklers, and then wrapped with nails held on with masking tape. The police said the material was flammable but could not have caused an explosion.
The boy put down his backpack at the Christmas market on November 26 but the detonator failed. He was “instigated or directed” by an unknown Isis member, Focus reported, and was reportedly receiving instructions by the mobile phone messenger Telegram, a free service that can exchange encrypted messages. It provides “self-destructing messages” that disappear after a time set by the sender.
The German federal public prosecutor office in Karlsruhe confirmed that it had opened an investigation.