German Chancellor Angela Merkel has pledged to improve the way authorities respond to terror attacks as survivors and dignitaries marked the anniversary of last year’s truck rampage at a Berlin Christmas market.
Mrs Merkel was fiercely criticised by relatives in an open letter earlier this month, for the way security services failed to stop the attack and the authorities’ handling of the aftermath.
In a brief statement following an inter-religious memorial service at the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church in the heart of west Berlin, she said she met relatives and some of the dozens of injured on Monday to hear their views.
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“It was a very open and, on the part of the people affected, very blunt conversation which showed the weaknesses our state displayed in this situation,” she said.
“We will do what’s humanly possible not just to ensure security but to help give those whose life was destroyed or affected the opportunity to return to their life. Today is a day of grief, but also a day of willingness to do better.”
People attend the opening of a memorial site in Berlin to honour the victims of the Christmas market attack one year ago. (Michael Sohn/AP/PA)
Justice minister Heiko Maas went further in acknowledging that painful errors had been made.
“We weren’t properly prepared for the consequences that such a terrorist attack would have for those who were affected,” Mr Maas wrote in Berlin daily Tagesspiegel.
“For this we can only apologise to the victims and the survivors,” he said, adding that the government owed it to the relatives to learn from its mistakes.
The attack, carried out by a Tunisian asylum-seeker and petty criminal who had been on authorities’ radar for months, was the deadliest in decades on German soil.
Anis Amri managed to flee the country but was shot dead by Italian police days after the attack, which was later claimed by the Islamic State group.
White roses sit beside a new memorial – a crack in the ground filled with gold – on the first anniversary of the Berlin Chrismas Market attack (Michael Sohn/AP/PA)
Italian authorities are still investigating whether Amri had contacts in Rome or Sicily who helped him.
Following the service, Berlin’s mayor Michael Mueller unveiled a memorial on the Breitscheidplatz featuring the names of those killed on December 19 last year.
The memorial includes an almost 17-metre rift in the ground that was filled with a gold-coloured metal, symbolising the lives torn apart in the attack.
Relatives and dignitaries, including Mrs Merkel, placed candles and laid white roses beside the memorial.
Church bells will ring later tonight for 12 minutes — one for each of the dead.