Terror suspect who rammed into crowd at Berlin Pride shot dead after ‘trying to stab cops’ during raid on garden shed
POLICE have shot and killed the suspect who allegedly rammed a van into a crowd at a Berlin Pride event on Saturday night.
Abdul Ballout, 21, ran at cops with a “stabbing weapon” as they raided a garden shed, police said.
He is suspected of killing one and injuring 29 others in a “terrorist attack” targeting pride celebrations last night.
The huge police operation to hunt down Ballout ended in a SWAT team gunning down the suspect in an allotment complex in Berlin‘s Spandau district on Sunday.
Cops said Ballout rushed at officers with a “stabbing weapon”.
Berlin Police said: “Around 6 pm, the suspect in yesterday’s attack in the Großer Tiergarten was located in an allotment garden facility in Spandau.
“According to current findings, he is said to have rushed toward our emergency forces with a stabbing weapon, after which police firearms were used by our SEK Berlin.
“Despite immediate resuscitation measures initiated by the Berlin Fire Department, he died at the scene.”
Witnesses said cops swarmed the area around 3pm, cordoning off the allotments.
Police then charged the gardens around 6pm.
Two volleys of gunfire were reportedly heard a few minutes apart during the raid.
The suspect was fatally wounded and died at 6.34pm, Bild reported.
Berlin’s Interior Minister Iris Spranger said: “I am grateful to the security authorities for finding the attacker so quickly. That is a tremendous achievement.”
At least one person was killed and 29 injured when a van ploughed into a crowd at Berlin’s Christopher Street Day (CSD) Pride parade around 10pm last night.
The suspect is thought to have then slammed the van into a tree, stabbed victims with a machete and fled on foot.
Police previously described the suspect as “armed and dangerous” as they deployed hundreds of officers and heat-seeking helicopters to search for him.
Ballout, a 21-year-old man, was a German citizen of Lebanese background.
Born in Germany, he had been imprisoned in Lebanon until October last year and was arrested by Berlin police on his return to Europe.
He was locked up in a juvenile detention facility then handed a suspended sentence while security services monitored him.
Ballout was known to cops – he was identified as a member of the city’s “Islamist scene” and had tried to join the Islamic State.
An Iranian man who police believe was also in the vehicle was arrested overnight.
Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt said “everything we are seeing here indicates that we have experienced an Islamist terror attack”.
Germany’s government warned it cannot rule out that “further terrorist attacks might take place”.
Berlin Mayor Kai Wegner called the incident “an attack on our free and open society”.
He wrote: “After a peaceful and colourful CSD, the assembly for a tolerant and peaceful Berlin was attacked in the most brutal way.”
