German authorities are investigating 40 cases where Islamic militants are suspected of entering the country as refugees.
The BKA, Germany’s federal bureau of investigation, has 369 warnings about possible extremists since the migrant crisis broke out in 2015. A BKA spokeswoman said Wednesday 40 individuals are now under investigation, which represents a doubling from the 18 investigations it conducted in January.
The possibility of terrorists taking advantage of the migrant crisis has been a concern among many Germans after the country decided to let in more than one million refugees in 2015. The BKA has now received credible indications that terrorists are in fact being smuggled into Germany in an organized fashion. (RELATED: Poland Won’t Accept Any More Refugees Over Terror Threat)
“German security officials have indications that members and supporters of terrorist organizations are being smuggled in with refugees in a targeted, organized way in order to launch attacks in Germany,” the BKA spokeswoman said.
At least two of the terrorists in the Nov. 13 Paris attack took advantage of the relaxed border controls to travel between the European Union and Syria. The head of Germany’s domestic intelligence agency, Hans-Georg Maassen, recently admitted authorities have no information on the identities of many migrants.
“I am not telling you a secret when I say that I am concerned about the high number of migrants whose identities we don’t know because they had no papers when they entered the country,” Maassen said at a May press conference.
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