There was some sort of firebomb attack and a hostage situation today in a McDonald’s restaurant in the mall area of the main train station in Cologne. As of this point, it’s not clear how or whether the standoff was resolved.
According to MissPiggy, who translated the video and ancillary material, the culprit was said to have detonated a Molotov cocktail in a fast food restaurant, injuring the 14-year-old girl.
Cologne: ‘Islamic State Sympathiser’ Takes Hostage, Sets Fires
- He had set a 14-year-old girl’s shoes and legs on fire with an incendiary device
- He also apparently wanted to set the kidnapped woman on fire
According to police, the perpetrator proclaimed allegiance to the terrorist militia ISIS. He called that out to passers-by. The police are investigating all leads. This also includes a possible terrorist background.
According to police, an ID document was found at the scene, which was issued to a 55-year-old Syrian. It was not yet definitively confirmed whether it belongs to the hostage-taker who was critically injured during the police operation.
You won’t get all those culture-enriching details from this MSM news video, however:
Many thanks to Vlad Tepes for the subtitling:
Video transcript:
| 00:00 | Liv von Boetticher is on location and on the phone. Liv, do you have any new | |
| 00:06 | information about the current situation? There is mounting evidence | |
| 00:11 | that in the McDonald’s which is near the pharmacy there was an incident | |
| 00:15 | in which a young girl was set on fire by an unknown man. | |
| 00:24 | The eyewitnesses with whom I have spoken reported that her foot was on fire. | |
| 00:29 | The girl then ran screaming for help, and trying to save herself she ran into the | |
| 00:33 | pharmacy. And there it became a hostage situation; as far as we understand, it was | |
| 00:41 | not the same victim from McDonald’s. The hostage was not the girl set on fire, who is | |
| 00:46 | now in the hospital, however that’s not confirmed. It was a further victim. The | |
| 00:51 | police and all available operational forces have gathered in Breslauer Square. | |
| 00:58 | A square directly in front of the main train station in Cologne with a subway | |
| 01:02 | entrance, Breslauer Square. The firefighters are here with large ranks. Rescue workers | |
| 01:08 | are here with a large roster. The police continue to arrive with other forces, | |
| 01:15 | including heavily armed police, but also crisis intervention, presumably | |
| 01:20 | psychologists to help calm the hostage situation in some way. | |
| 01:26 | Just need to ask again, from where did you get this information now with this incident | |
| 01:31 | in the McDonald’s? Does it comes directly from the police or from eyewitness reports | |
| 01:36 | and, yes, how sure is that this actually happened to the girl? | |
| 01:40 | Up until now, the police have only confirmed that there was a hostage | |
| 01:45 | situation in the pharmacy. I spoke with eyewitnesses who were in the McDonald’s | |
| 01:49 | and saw what happened. I was near the McDonald’s and saw large amounts | |
| 01:55 | of water coming from under the doors, which indicates a fire triggered the sprinkler | |
| 02:02 | system inside the McDonald’s. It is probable that something else was set on | |
| 02:06 | fire, but that is speculation at the moment. —Please help me understand this: in other | |
| 02:16 | words, first there was the incident in McDonald’s and then the alleged culprit | |
| 02:20 | took someone else as a hostage in the pharmacy? How do you construe the | |
| 02:27 | series of events up until now? After everything I have learned from | |
| 02:32 | different sides, it appears that a young girl, approximately 15 years old was attacked | |
| 02:43 | in McDonald’s. She was, in some manner, set on fire. Witnesses told me earlier | |
| 02:53 | that they saw a bottle of flammable liquid, which I cannot confirm at the moment. | |
| 02:59 | There are wild rumours springing up everywhere, but still, it appears to have | |
| 03:05 | actually resulted in a fire with smoke, because the sprinkler system in the | |
| 03:12 | McDonald’s was activated. Large amounts of water are coming out of the McDonald’s. | |
| 03:16 | The eyewitnesses also reported that the girl was screaming for help and ran outside. | |
| 03:23 | The pharmacy in which the hostage situation is happening is approximately | |
| 03:28 | Nine yards away from the McDonald’s. The witnesses also said that the girl ran into the | |
| 03:37 | pharmacy for help or at least was near the pharmacy. How the culprit | |
| 03:42 | was able to take someone hostage, and if he followed the girl to the pharmacy, | |
| 03:52 | I am not able to tell you at the moment. The witness I spoke to told me the girl that was | |
| 03:59 | set on fire has been taken to the hospital, but that has not been confirmed by the | |
| 04:03 | police. So, for that reason, it is all very speculative. | |
| 04:07 | Liv von Boetticher, nevertheless, thank you. At the main train station in | |
| 04:12 | Cologne. You will keep us informed. Thank you. |
Wow, newspeak in German, “ein vermutlich unbekannter Mann” = “a probably unknown man” may be the perpetrator.
“Local media say the incident does not appear to have been terror-related.” – BBC News report (8 sentences in total)
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-45862091
Well with details like this one could speculate it was an attempted witch burning.