German authorities were Friday hunting a militant climate activist suspected of a spate of attacks on the power grid, the latest sabotage targeting critical infrastructure.
The 48-year-old man, named in German media as Daniel V., sent letters claiming responsibility for the acts and suspected explosives were found during searches of his apartment, officials said.
Germany has been rattled by attacks on electricity substations across the country this week which were apparently aimed at cutting power from coal-fired power stations and causing widespread blackouts.
“We must assume that this is a case of climate extremism,” Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt told journalists.
The Bild tabloid reported that a heavily armed elite police team had stormed a truck in Hambach Forest in North Rhine-Westphalia suspected of belonging to the activist, but had failed to apprehend him.
The area is highly symbolic for Germany’s climate movement. Activists spent years protesting plans to raze vast tracts of forest to expand the nearby Hambach open-cast lignite mine.
Earlier, police had raided the suspect’s apartment in the town Gevelsberg, in western North Rhine-Westphalia state, after security officials and media received his letters claiming the attacks.
They discovered “suspicious substances and suspected explosive materials or devices”, the state’s interior minister Herbert Reul told journalists.
‘No justification’
The letters, which contained detailed descriptions of the attack plans, were presumed to be authentic, he said.
“The author cites as his motive the fight against fossil fuels,” said Reul.
However, the minister stressed that “attacking critical infrastructure is a crime… There is no justification for this crime, no ideology that counts as an excuse.”
The attacks followed the same pattern, with firework-like devices used to shoot wires at overhead cables at substations in a bid to cause short circuits and cut power from nearby coal-powered plants.
While there were no major outages, power-generating units at some plants had to be taken off the grid for a a time.
The first attacked happened on Tuesday morning when a substation in eastern Brandenburg state was targeted, damaging power cables and briefly disrupting supply.
A further attack followed later the same day targeting a substation in North Rhine-Westphalia.
Authorities say he also confessed in his letter to planning further attacks, while devices to launch small rockets were found at other locations.
Germany has faced a spate of attacks on the power grid in recent times, with far-left activists claiming responsibility in some cases.
The most serious took place in Berlin in January, causing an electricity outage that left tens of thousands of homes and thousands of businesses without power for nearly a week in the middle of winter.
The far-left “Vulkangruppe” (Volcano Group) claimed responsibility for the arson attack on high-voltage cables that caused that blackout.
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