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Three quarters of Germans fear terror attack 'soon'

The Local Germany
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Three quarters of Germans fear terror attack 'soon'
Police guard a football stadium. Photo: DPA

A vast majority of Germans believe terrorism will soon strike Germany, with 77 percent fearing an attack will take place in the near future, according to a new survey.

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That figure has shot up from 69 percent just two weeks ago, although that isn't a huge surprise, given that the intervening weeks have seen not only a huge attack in Nice, France, on the country's national day, but also Monday night's attack on a train in Bavaria which left four people seriously injured. Both attacks were claimed by the terror group Isis.

However, while it has emerged that the Nice attacker had apparently been planning the carnage for months with accomplices, the 17-year-old responsible for the attack in Würzburg does not seem to have had any direct contact with Isis members and his social media showed no clues of Islamist leanings until 24 hours before the attack.

And despite growing fears that Germany could be a target for terror groups, the majority of those surveyed (59 percent - up three points from July 1st) believe that German authorities are doing enough to protect the public from terrorism.

Supporters of the Green Party were the most likely to be confident that the government was doing a good job in providing adequate security; the far-right AfD was the only political party where a majority of supporters did not agree that enough was being done.

The 'political barometer' survey carried out by German broadcaster ZDF regularly polls the German public with a series of questions relating to current political issues.

Another key question this week was whether Turkey should be allowed to join the European Union, with the vast majority of Germans (87 percent) against the idea. Following the failed military putsch, 80 percent of respondents believed President Erdogan's position had been strengthened and 87 percent said they thought that democracy was seriously in danger in Turkey.

After the coup, Erdogan took a hardline against the plotters, mulling the reintroduction of the death penalty and announcing a temporary withdrawal from the European Convention on Human Rights as part of its state of emergency. Merkel slammed the "revolting scenes of revenge" in the wake of the coup, but plenty of Turkish Germans took to the streets in support of Erdogan.

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