German couple arrested for 'Boston marathon-style' attack plot

German police have arrested two people on suspicion of plotting an Islamist terror attack on the Eschborn-Frankfurt bicycle race.

Frankfurt attorney general Albert Schreiber said police raided the address of a couple yesterday. finding a pipe bomb, parts of an assault rifle and 100 rounds of ammunition, and three litres of hydrogen peroxide, which is explosive in high concentrations.

Police believe the couple, who are of Turkish descent and named only as Halil and Senay D, were plotting a Boston marathon-style attack on the annual bike race, a 127-mile professional race that loops around Eschborn and Frankfurt in western Germany.

The race, which was set to happen today, was cancelled yesterday after police warned that there may still be danger of an attack.

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The couple were arrested at their home in Oberursel, near Frankfurt, after a period spent under police observation.

Florian Flade, a journalist at German newspaper Die Welt, told CNN that the observation began when a garden centre employee called the police after the couple bought a large amount of hydrogen peroxide.

German police then established that the pair had previously gone to Spain to meet with Islamic extremists. Last week, police spotted Halil D in a small forest near the race route, suspecting that he was looking for a place to hide explosives

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The couple had ties to radical Islamists operating in the Frankfurt area. Peter Beuth, the interior minister for Hesse, said: "We suspect there was a Salafist background", referring to the strict, literalist interpretation of Islam.

He added: "Police investigations at this stage indicate that we have thwarted an Islamist attack."

In a statement, the Hesse State Office of Criminal Investigation said: "Many people were looking forward, as always, to tomorrow's annual event. But because of the risk, and the fact that too many questions are unanswered, security is essential at this time."