Interview: Europe should fight against "lone wolf" attacks from its root: expert

A German expert has called for efforts to address "lone wolf" attacks from its root.

Dr. Ahmed Badawi, project director in Middle East Policy Center of Otto-Suhr Politics Institute in Free University of Berlin, believes "it is almost impossible to protect against an individual attacker intending to kill other people."

"We need to consider the reasons behind all the violence, including social, cultural and economic reasons," Badawi said in a recent interview with Xinhua.

Recently, European countries were shocked by a high frequency of terror attacks. In July, a series of attacks committed by individual attackers happened in Germany within one week, making security situation in this country more grave. Investigators said terrorism motives may not be excluded in some attacks.

"Like the rest of Europe and the world, Germany is threatened by a very deadly ideology," Badawi said.

Except for security means, measures in terms of education, culture and economics should also be applied, "in oder to prevent those who are angry from taking their anger and frustration out on society, either by going into the direction of terrorism or right wing extremism," he added.

"We have to be very nuanced in our explanation of attacks occurred. We have to make sure that our stories do not create the motive for more similar activities to happen," Badawi said, calling for efforts to stop "creating fear unnecessarily."

Because two among the four successive attacks in Germany were committed by refugees, concerns about government's refugee policy are raised again in German society.

Badawi viewed the association of terrorism with refugee issue as a mistake. "Two attacks were committed by refugees. Two refugees out of more than one million refugees came to Germany last year."

Citing France and Belgium as examples, he said all the attacks happening there were committed by people born in the countries, not by refugees.

"We should not create the condition to make all the Muslims under threats. It would exactly lead to more Muslims to be radicalized," he added.

Talking about German government's refugee policy, Badawi said Germany has done the right thing by fulfilling its international humanitarian obligations.

"Germany couldn't keep its door closed to all those people surviving from war. Maybe it's not the most intelligent thing from a security perspective. But I think Germany has done the right thing morally, perhaps even economically," he said. Endit