A chilling incident that saw a young boy and his mother pushed in front for a high-speed train by an Eritrean man has sent shock waves across Germany and seemingly rekindled anti-migrant sentiment.
The tragedy took place at one of the platforms of the central railway terminal in the German city of Frankfurt – the nation’s second busiest railway hub. An eight-year-old boy and his mother were waiting for a train when they were suddenly attacked by a 40-year-old Eritrean. The assailant grabbed the woman and the child and threw them on the rail tracks right as the high-speed intercity express (ICE) was pulling into the station.
The 40-year-old woman managed to escape near-certain death as she got to a pathway between two tracks. She was still trying to reach out to her son, when the train hit the boy and ran him down, a witness told German media. The boy died at the scene.
The terrible scene left all those at the station shaken. The ambulances that arrived shortly had to hospitalize some people suffering from shock. The boy’s mother was also hospitalized, though there has been no information on her condition.
The perpetrator also sought to force another person onto the railway tracks but his third would-be victim escaped. Then the attacker attempted to flee the scene but was pursued by a group of passengers and eventually detained by the police outside the terminal.
The motive of the attack remains unclear, yet the police admitted that the suspect deliberately assaulted the woman and the boy, thus treating the incident as a homicide. The assailant had no personal connections to his victims, and little is known about him besides his Eritrean citizenship. According to some reports, he came to Switzerland back in 2006, and has lived there since.
Wir können bestätigen. dass der festgenommene Tatverdächtige eritreischer Staatsbürger ist. *fp
— Polizei Frankfurt (@Polizei_Ffm) July 29, 2019
The incident has appalled Germany as people turned to social media to express their shock and grief over the tragedy. Interior Minister Horst Seehofer interrupted his vacation and called an emergency meeting with security officials.
He said he was “deeply upset” by the attack and vowed that the perpetrator would be brought to justice “to the full extent of the law.”
Yet, while Germany was visibly united in sorrow over the child’s death, the incident also appeared to reignite the simmering tensions over immigration that have gripped the nation ever since Chancellor Angela Merkel opened Germany’s borders for the hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers and migrants at the height of the 2015 refugee crisis.
Wir können bestätigen. dass der festgenommene Tatverdächtige eritreischer Staatsbürger ist. *fp
— Polizei Frankfurt (@Polizei_Ffm) July 29, 2019
While most people online expressed their condolences to the boy’s family, some also blamed the “evil witch” Merkel for what happened. Others vented their frustration over what they saw as the lenient approach to foreign criminals, saying the suspect would be declared “traumatized” and eventually “acquitted.”
Politicians from the right-wing Alternative for Germany party also linked the incident to faulty immigration policies. The party’s parliamentary faction chief, Alice Weidel, denounced the attack as an “unprecedented act of cruelty.” “What else has to happen?” she asked while calling on the authorities to “finally protect the citizens of our country instead of [promoting] the limitless welcome culture.”
Laut Polizei #Frankfurt hat ein 40-jähriger Afrikaner den 8-jährigen und seine Mutter auf die Gleise gestoßen. An Entsetzlichkeit ist diese Tat kaum mehr zu überbieten - was muss noch passieren? Schützt endlich die Bürger unseres Landes - statt der grenzenlosen Willkommenskultur!
— Alice Weidel (@Alice_Weidel) July 29, 2019
Other German politicians blamed AfD for trying to exploit the tragedy and spread hatred.
“An eight-year-old child dies – and what does the AfD do? They spread their disgusting and racist hatred!” German MP and the head of the Left Party Bernd Riexinger said in a Twitter post.
Ein achtjähriges Kind stirbt nach einer schrecklichen Tat in #Frankfurt und was macht die @AfD? Sie verbreiten ihre widerliche und rassistische Hetze auf @Twitter! Es geht ihnen darum Hass zu verbreiten und Menschen gegeneinander aufzuwiegeln.
— Bernd Riexinger (@b_riexinger) July 29, 2019
As the public anxiety grew, Seehofer had to call for calm. The interior minister said that “some parts of the public” already formed an opinion on the matter and said that any conclusions could be made only after “all the details are cleared.”
Merkel has not yet issued any statements on the matter.
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