[ad_1]
Austrian police are investigating whether an Islamist terrorist who killed four people in Vienna on Monday night was part of a larger network and whether the attack could have been prevented.
Kujtim Fejzulai, known to the authorities as a sympathizer of the Islamic State group, which took credit for the killings, was believed to be the only gunman in the attack despite hours of uncertainty about whether the accomplices were still at large.
The 20-year-old from Austria and North Macedonia was shot dead nine minutes after the attack in central Vienna.
Austrian police conducted raids on 18 properties linked to the attacker on Tuesday and made 14 arrests. Two men were also arrested in the Swiss city of Winterthur, near Zurich, after Fejzulai was reported to have met them in Switzerland.
Fejzulai is also believed to have traveled to neighboring Slovakia in July accompanied by another man, where he attempted to purchase ammunition suitable for the weapons he used in the attack, but the sale reportedly failed after he failed to present a weapons license from fire.
The Slovak authorities are said to have informed their Austrian counterparts at the time. The men were traveling in a car registered in the name of the mother of an Islamist known to the police.
Austrian Interior Minister Karl Nehammer said Tuesday that authorities knew Fejzulai as an Isis sympathizer. He had been sentenced to 22 months in an Austrian prison on April 25, 2019 for affiliation to a terrorist organization, after attempting to cross from the Turkish border, where he had encountered two Germans and a Belgian, into Syria.
The sentence was suspended in December last year on the condition that probation services periodically supervise him and participate in a de-radicalization program.
Nehammer and Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz, both from the conservative People’s Party, have criticized his premature release from prison. Nehammer said that Fejzulai had been able to mislead his mentors in such a way that they did not register early warning signs of his radicalization. He said it pointed to “a flaw in our system”, which had allowed “a premature release of a radicalized person.”
Alma Zadić, the Green Party justice minister, defended the decision, saying it was legal and that he had been released on parole. The Justice Ministry later said that it had not been informed about Fejzulai’s attempts to buy ammunition in Slovakia, and said it would have been grounds for his arrest.
The government met Wednesday to discuss the security situation and whether the attack could have been prevented.
Reinhold Einwallner of the Social Democratic Party said he was astonished that the attacker’s attempt to buy ammunition, particularly when his affiliation with Isis was known, had not triggered a security alert. “I should have sounded the alarm bells,” he told the Austrian newspaper Kurier.
He called for a more intense exchange of information between the ministries of Justice and the Interior on people considered a threat to security, saying: “the number of IS [Isis] the returnees is of a manageable size. “
The Justice Ministry said it had not been informed about Fejzulai’s attempts to buy ammunition in Slovakia, and said it would have been grounds for his arrest.
The far-right, populist Freedom Party said the role of the intelligence service must be urgently examined. “There are numerous indications that this terrorist and the circles in which he moved have been on the radar of the intelligence services for a long time. And if that was the case, why didn’t they take this terrorist off the streets? Herbert Kickl said of the match.
Nikolaus Rast, a lawyer who represented Fejzulai, said his client had been adrift and was “easy prey” for terrorist groups. “He left me with the impression of being a young man looking for something, that he did not know his place in society, that he had failed to find a suitable apprenticeship and was therefore easy prey for certain groups,” he said. to the magazine. tabloid Bild.
Three men, two of Turkish origin and one Palestinian, were hailed as heroes for risking their lives at the scene of the attack to help some of the wounded.
Mikail Özen, 25, and Recep Tayyip Gültekin, 21, were about to park their car at Schwedenplatz before enjoying one last coffee together before a coronavirus lockdown when the shooting began. They ran to the aid of a woman they saw lying on the ground and shot Gültekin.
“The attacker shot him. But Recep was able to intuitively save himself by making a forward roll, ”Özen said. They managed to get the woman to safety.
Osma Yoda, 23, who had been working at a McDonald’s in the square, was helping his boss load boxes when they encountered the gunman. “He was hiding in the entrance of a closed garage and was shooting at passersby,” the Palestinian said. When two policemen arrived, the gunman shot them, hitting one of them. “I dragged him behind a concrete bench and tried to stop the bleeding,” Yoda told Kurier. “He continued firing from a distance of about 20 to 30 meters. There was blood everywhere. “
He then helped officers get him to a nearby ambulance, assisted by Gültekin and Özen, both amateur martial artists. The men were received by both the Turkish ambassador to Austria and the mayor of Vienna, who thanked them for their actions.
A police officer on duty the night of the attack described the confusion and chaos as he and his colleagues attempted to secure area bars and restaurants. “The bullets kept coming and we were rescuing the wounded, but we didn’t know where to take them, because we didn’t know where the asshole was,” he told the Austrian news agency APA.
The 27 injured people, who suffered gunshot and stab wounds, were said to be no longer in critical condition. Among the dead, it was said that there was a student from the University of Applied Arts.
