MILAN: Italian police on Friday shot dead the prime suspect in the Berlin Christmas market attack, ending a frantic four-day hunt for Europe’s most-wanted man.

Tunisian Anis Amri, 24, is believed to have hijacked a truck and used it to mow down holiday revellers at the market on Monday, killing 12 and wounding dozens more.

The militant Islamic State group has claimed responsibility and released a video on Friday in which Amri is shown pledging allegiance to IS chief Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

He had been missing since escaping after the attack on Monday, but his time on the run was cut short thanks to a combination of luck and the quick reflexes of rookie police officer Luca Scata.

The 29-year-old, still officially a trainee, shot the Tunisian twice after he had fired on his patrol partner, Christian Movio, 36.

The officers had stopped Amri in the early hours of Friday, near Milan’s Sesto San Giovanni train station. They had no idea of who they were dealing with.

“He was completely calm, they asked him to empty his backpack and with a sudden movement he pulled out the pistol, which was loaded and ready to use,” said Roberto Guida, the neighbourhood police head.

Police said Amri had initially tried to pass himself off as being from southern Italy and had shouted “bastard police” in Italian before opening fire.

German authorities are investigating whether Amri was part of a “network” with accomplices still at large.

Chancellor Angela Merkel welcomed the news, saying: “We can be relieved at the end of this week that the acute danger is over. However the danger of terrorism in general endures, as it has for several years. We all know that.” Amri’s death came as German police arrested two brothers on suspicion of planning to attack a shopping mall, while authorities in both Australia and Indonesia reported that Christmas terror plots had been foiled.

Amri’s port of entry to Europe was Italy, arriving on a migrant boat in 2011, and spending four years in prison there afterwards.

Convicted for starting a fire in a refugee centre, he served out his sentence until 2015, then made his way to Germany, taking advantage of continental Europe’s Schengen system of open borders — as he did on his return to Italy this week.

Milan police chief Antonio De Iesu said Amri had arrived in Italy from Germany via France. He had no telephone on him and only a few hundred euros.

German police said they found his finger prints in the truck, next to the body of its registered Polish driver, who was killed with a gunshot to the head. A 100,000-euro ($104,000) reward had been offered for information leading to Amri’s arrest.

Published in Dawn December 24th, 2016