Suspect arrested after sabotage of high-voltage power lines in North Rhine-Westphalia
A 48-year-old from the Ruhr region was arrested near the Weisweiler power plant near Aachen. He is believed to have triggered short circuits on German high-voltage power lines using homemade rockets.
Arrest following power grid sabotage across multiple German states
Near the Weisweiler power plant near Aachen, police arrested a 48-year-old man from Gevelsberg in the southern Ruhr region. According to marchanzeiger.ch, citing the Deutsche Presse-Agentur, the suspect had drawn attention near the power plant that had already been the focus of investigators shortly beforehand.
Authorities had been searching for the man for several days. He is suspected of attempting to fire self-constructed rockets carrying conductive wires over high-voltage power lines in North Rhine-Westphalia, Brandenburg and Saxony, thereby triggering short circuits. On Monday, several launch devices were discovered again on a high-voltage power line near Weisweiler – at the same location where police moved in shortly afterwards. Investigators also found another confession letter there.
Short circuits in Bergheim and Brandenburg
The attacks succeeded in at least two cases. In Bergheim west of Cologne, a short circuit disabled several power plant units for several days. At the Turnow-Preilack switching station near the Jänschwalde power plant in Brandenburg, more than 20 homemade rockets caused two short circuits by firing conductive material onto the lines. In neither case did this result in a widespread power outage.
Federal Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt recently described the attacks as an obvious act of "climate terrorism" by a lone perpetrator.
Confession letters with political motive
Several confession letters are available regarding the series of attacks, which investigating authorities believe to be authentic and attribute to the 48-year-old. The sabotage is justified in these letters through the struggle against fossil fuels. "Power generation from fossil fuels is a crime," the letters state. Lignite coal continues to be mined and used for power generation in all three affected states.
Source: Google News CH — Crime (de)