Munich train stations reopen amid terror threat

Police in the southern German city of Munich say they are looking for “five to seven” suspects following an alert that temporarily shut down two of the city’s railway stations on New Year’s Eve.

According to the president of Munich police, Hubertus Andrae, the police would continue to carry out more controls in the urban area in next few days and he asked for understanding. “I considered this decision to be correct, since we can not take unnecessary risks in the face of such concrete threats”.

However, he urged people to go about their everyday lives as normal, saying: “Anything else would be grist to the mill of those who would rather have us living in fear”.

However, not even terrorist threats could keep Europeans from ringing in the new year – though every capital city was saturated with security, especially Paris – where terrorists struck twice this past year. (Sven Hoppe/dpa via AP) MUNICH, GERMANY – JANUARY 01: Police men guard the main entrance in front of Munich main station on January 1, 2016 in Munich, Germany.

New year ushered in amid tightened security after USA and Belgian arrests and tip-off about Munich attack.

Opposition to her stance grew at home and overseas after two of the suicide bombers in the November 13 Paris attacks were found to be have been carrying fake Syria passports.

Late Thursday, officials said they had “serious information” that an attack was planned and warned residents to stay away from the city’s main train station and another station in the Pasing neighborhood.

Elmar Thevesse, a terrorism expert and ZDF’s deputy editor-in-chief said: “German security officials regarded the source behind the tipoff “rather non-credible”, and parts of the information itself as hard to believe”.

Although the train stations have been evacuated, the spokeswoman said it could not be ruled out that the attackers could seek another target. The stations have since reopened.

“One should never get used to terror”, German Interior Minister Thomas De Maiziere told reporters.

“The tips included specified times and locations of the assailants from IS and we quickly came to the conclusion that we couldn’t just ignore the warnings from the intelligence agencies”, Herrmann told Bavaria’s BR public television network.

A record number of police officers patrolled the event. “Up to now they have handled them all very calmly and authoritatively”, said Tophoven. “There must have been more to it”.

Authorities were investigating intensively, Mr Herrmann said, but so far had not made any arrests.