Concerns as second German soldier arrested in 'anti-refugee' plot

A second German soldier who posed as a Syrian migrant to plot the false-flag assassination of pro-refugee politicians was detained by police on Tuesday.

The suspect, identified only as Maximilian T., aged 27, was detained from the same Franco-German army base near Strasbourg where his co-conspirator, Franco Albrecht, was also stationed.

Albrecht, 28, was arrested on 26 April for his part in planning the false-flag shooting attack against pro-immigration politicians, which the pair had intended to blame on Muslim migrants and refugees.

He had posed as a fruit-vendor from Damascus to register as a Syrian refugee, despite speaking no Arabic, and was granted a space in a shelter and monthly benefits.

The pair had drawn up a list of pro-refugee politicians to kill, including former German President Joachim Gauck and Justice Minister Heiko Maas.

Albrecht was set to carry out the attack while Maxilimilian T., who served in the same infantry battalion, created the death list and helped procure a French-made handgun from Vienna.

Another man, 24-year-old student Mathias F, was also arrested for planning the murder, which the group had hoped would "be seen by the population as a radical Islamist terrorist act committed by a recognised refugee", prosecutors said.

Both Maximilian and Albrecht were part of online far-right extremist chat groups, while it has emerged that the latter expressed extremist views in a 2014 master's thesis which theorised that immigration would end Western civilisation.

The strange cases have put pressure on Germany's Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen, who criticised "attitude and leadership problems" within the military, angering many in the armed services.

Germany has taken in more than one million asylum seekers since 2015, many from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, sparking an anti-foreigner backlash and a spate of racist hate crimes.