Russian arrested in Berlin over 'planned bomb attack'

A Russian man believed to hold radical Islamist views has been arrested in Berlin on suspicion of planning an attack with explosives.

Police said the man, named as Magomed-Ali C, and a French accomplice had stockpiled explosives in their flat in October 2016.

However, their plans were disrupted by police and they separated soon after.

The Frenchman, Clément B, was arrested in Marseilles in April 2017, accused of plotting an imminent attack.

German prosecutors said that the pair had planned an attack "at an unknown location in Germany, meant to maim or kill the greatest possible number of people".

The explosives found in Magomed-Ali C's flat was triacetone triperoxide, or TATP, which has been used in several terror attacks, including the 2017 bomb attack on Manchester Arena and the 2015 Paris attacks claimed by the Islamic State (IS) group.

French police found the same substance at Clément B's Marseille home last year - along with an IS flag, a loaded Uzi sub-machine gun, two pistols, and a homemade grenade.

Both Magomed-Ali C and Clément B reportedly attended the same mosque as Anis Amri, a Tunisian extremist who killed 12 people at a Berlin Christmas market in 2016 by hijacking a lorry and driving it into the crowd.

The now closed mosque in Moabit was a hub for Chechen extremists, a number of whom went to fight with jihadists in Syria and Iraq, the Berliner Morgenpost newspaper reported.

Clément B had contact with Amri during this period, the newspaper said.

However, investigators say there is no evidence that either Magomed-Ali C or Clément B were involved in Amri's attack.