Berlin says Riyadh help prevented terror attacks

German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere speaks to the media on Wednesday at police headquarters in Bremen. Germany's Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere is preparing to unveil a slew of new anti-terror measures, reports said Wednesday, after two attacks in July claimed by the Daesh group. ( AFP / dpa / Carmen Jaspersen)

BERLIN: Information provided by the Kingdom helped in preventing a number of terrorist attacks in Germany, said the spokesperson of the German Foreign Ministry, Sawsan Chebli, on Wednesday.
Earlier, Gen. Mansour Al-Turki, spokesman of the Ministry of Interior, said that Saudi Arabia had cooperated with Germany when a Daesh cell used a social media account, which was operated with a Saudi-registered number.
Al-Turki said that German authorities have contacted him as part of their investigations. A number of bilateral meetings and exchanges of information between the two countries were held through security cooperation channels to learn the background of the communications of the Daesh cell.
He said that the coordination was still going on to find others involved.
He said that the Kingdom was keen to cooperate in everything, which would help in fighting terror.
Spokespersons of both Germany’s Foreign and Interior Ministries have welcomed the offer it received from the Kingdom to help in the probe of the attacks.

Raids
German police on Wednesday raided the homes and workplaces of three people suspected of trying to recruit supporters for Daesh, the Federal Prosecutor’s office said.
No arrests were made. One of the suspects is believed to have provided financial and logistical support for the militant group, a spokeswoman said, noting that the raids took place in the states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Lower Saxony.
German media said searches were carried out in the cities of Duisburg, Dortmund, Duesseldorf and Hildesheim.
“The three suspects are believed to have tried to recruit members and supporters for the foreign terrorist organization Islamic State between January and July 2015,” the spokeswoman said.
She said that no further details about the case could be revealed, since the investigation was ongoing.
Germany is on high alert after two Islamist attacks by two asylum seekers in July that killed only the attackers.
Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere will propose new security measures on Thursday, including speedier deportations and waiving doctor-patient confidentiality in some cases, German media reported.
“We live in difficult times, the terror threat is high, the police are overstretched,” he said during a visit to a center for the deradicalization of Islamists.

(Additional input from agencies)