Saudi suspect charged in deadly Magdeburg Christmas market attack

German prosecutors have filed charges against a Saudi national accused of plowing a vehicle into a crowded Christmas market in Magdeburg last December, killing six people and injuring hundreds more.

Fifty-year-old psychiatrist Taleb Jawad al-Abdulmohsen faces six counts of murder and 338 counts of attempted murder, prosecutors announced Wednesday.

Authorities say Abdulmohsen drove a rented SUV into the market at high speed with the aim of killing “as many people as possible.” He was arrested near the site shortly after the attack.

Prosecutors said Abdulmohsen, who has lived in Germany since 2006, acted alone and was motivated by “unhappiness and frustration” stemming from a series of legal disputes.

Read more: German Christmas market attack death toll rises to 5, over 200 injured

The suspect had long been known to police. In January, then-interior minister Nancy Faeser revealed that law enforcement had recorded 105 incidents involving his erratic behavior prior to the Magdeburg attack. She described him as “massively Islamophobic and close to right-wing extremist ideologies” while also being influenced by “incoherent conspiracy theories.”

The attack in Magdeburg was one of several violent incidents attributed to foreign nationals in the months before Germany’s general election in February. The wave of attacks pushed immigration to the forefront of the campaign and bolstered support for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which captured more than 20 percent of the vote, its strongest showing to date.

Since taking office in May, Conservative Chancellor Friedrich Merz has pledged to enforce stricter immigration rules, making border control and asylum reform central to his government’s platform.