(REUTERS) – A minute’s silence was held before a Bundesliga match in Dortmund on Tuesday (December 20) for the victims of an attack on a Christmas market in Berlin.
Both sets of players from Borussia Dortmund and Augsburg stood in silence around the centre circle at the Westfalenstadion.
Christmas markets in Berlin stayed shut on Tuesday as the city mourned the victims of the previous evening’s truck rampage, while security measures were stepped up at similar events elsewhere in Germany and abroad.
Germany’s interior ministry said other Christmas markets and large gatherings would not be called off, and appropriate steps to increase security should be decided at each location.
Flags flew at half-mast out of respect for those killed when a truck ploughed into a crowd at a market by Berlin’s Kaiser Wilhelm memorial church on Monday.
German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere aksi said on Tuesday the perpetrator of the truck attack on a Berlin Christmas market was probably still on the run and that a suspect arrested in connection with the crime was released due to lack of evidence.
“That’s why it is true that one cannot rule out that the perpetrator is still at large,” De Maiziere told ZDF television.
He added police had not just followed a single lead but multiple leads from the start, saying it remained beyond doubt that the truck incident was an attack, but that the motives remain unclear.