BERLIN (AP) — Germany’s prime prosecutor has taken over the investigation into an alleged arson assault on the ability provide of the electrical automotive firm Tesla close to Berlin.
A spokeswoman mentioned there’s an preliminary suspicion {that a} terrorist group could have been concerned within the assault. In such circumstances, the federal prosecutor’s workplace, the highest legislation enforcement company in Germany, is accountable for the investigation.
On Tuesday, manufacturing at Tesla’s electrical car plant in Gruenheide got here to a standstill and employees had been evacuated after an influence outage that officers suspected was brought on by arson. Tens of hundreds of residents, close by hospitals, nursing properties and an enormous logistics middle for a German grocery chain had been additionally affected.
Authorities within the state of Brandenburg, the place the plant is positioned, mentioned unidentified folks had been suspected of intentionally setting hearth to a high-voltage transmission line on an influence pylon.
A far-left group known as the Volcano Group mentioned it was behind the fireplace and accused Tesla in a letter of confession of “excessive exploitation situations” and known as for the “full destruction of the gigafactory,” German information company dpa reported.
The police consider that the letter is real and are searching for witnesses who can present details about the incident and attainable suspects.
Whereas electrical energy for residents has been restored, Tesla continues to be with out energy and the corporate has mentioned that the harm trigger by the outage is within the hundreds of thousands. It might take till the tip of subsequent week earlier than Tesla may have electrical energy once more, native media reported.
Elon Musk, Tesla’s CEO, condemned the incident, writing on X, previously Twitter, that “these are both the dumbest eco-terrorists on Earth or they’re puppets of those that don’t have good environmental objectives.”
“Stopping manufacturing of electrical automobiles, quite than fossil gas automobiles, ist extrem dumm,” he added in his put up on Tuesday, utilizing German for “extraordinarily silly.”
The facility outage got here as environmental activists have been protesting in a forest close to the plant towards plans by Tesla to develop. Dozens of activists have put up tents and constructed treehouses, a tactic utilized in earlier environmental protests.
Tesla opened the manufacturing facility in March 2022, launching a problem to German automakers on their house turf.
The corporate needs to develop the ability so as to add a freight depot, warehouses and an organization kindergarten. These plans would entail felling greater than 100 hectares (247 acres) of forest.
That has drawn opposition from environmentalists and another native teams, which additionally fear in regards to the attainable impact on the world’s water provide. In a nonbinding vote in mid-February, residents of the municipality rejected Tesla’s plans, which nonetheless want approval by native authorities.
About 12,500 folks work on the plant.