Anti-terror barriers “lovingly wrapped” in Christmas paper to disguise their grim purpose are springing up across Germany.
“Suddenly, overnight, they were there: huge Christmas parcels in Bochum’s city center; wrapped in pretty wrapping paper with stars, firs — and as a topping a red bow,” reads a Welt report on the new “decorations” in the North Rhine-Westphalia city of Bochum.
“It was important for us to fit the ugly barriers into the beautiful overall ensemble,” explained a Bochum Marketing spokesman.
“That’s why we wrapped the 1.2-ton sandbags and provided them with red ribbons.”
Bochum’s boulevard will be closed to transport for the first time this year, Welt adds.
Such objects, designed to deter the vehicle ramming attacks which have become popular among Islamist terrorists in recent years, have been dubbed #MerkelLego — after the German chancellor and the resemblance of some of the more common designs to the children’s building block toy.
Mrs Merkel has been held widely responsible for worsening Europe’s security situation, in particular with her declaration that there was “no limit” on the number of supposed refugees she was willing to accept in 2015, when the EU was already struggling to cope with the migrant crisis.
Germans enjoying Christmas festivities were last targeted in 2016, when a bogus asylum seeker from Tunisia murdered a Polish lorry driver, hijacked his vehicle, and ploughed it into crowds at a Berlin Christmas market, killing 12 and injuring over 50.
Perpetrator Anis Amri fled the scene on foot and promptly escaped Germany, which dismantled its border controls — along with most other EU member-states — with the establishment of the frontierless Schengen Area.
He was caught by accident in Italy during a routine stop, shooting one policeman before being shot and killed in turn by rookie officer Luca Scata.
European citizens have also been targeted by vehicle ramming attacks in countries including France, Spain, the United Kingdom, and even neutral Sweden, where the perpetrator was — like Amri — a bogus asylum seeker who was supposed to be in line for deportation.
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