BERLIN: A German soldier was charged on Tuesday with plotting to kill senior politicians because of their support for refugees and trying to make it look like asylum seekers carried out the murders.

The officer, named only as Franco Hans A., was arrested in April in a case that shocked Germans and stirred a debate about the depth of right-wing radicalism in the Bundeswehr military.

“Motivated by a nationalist attitude, he planned to carry out an attack at an unknown time on high-ranking politicians and public figures who stood up for what the accused regarded as an especially refugee-friendly policy,” the federal prosecutor’s office said.

“He wanted people to believe that his attacks were related to radical Islamist terrorism committed by somebody who had been granted asylum,” it added.

The statement did not say whether the soldier had denied the charges or include any statement from his lawyer.

Among the targets were Justice Minister Heiko Maas, a senior Social Democrat, Greens politician Claudia Roth as well as human rights activists and journalists, the prosecutor’s office added.

Published in Dawn, December 13th, 2017