German Ricin Bomb Plot Conviction Highlights Non-Conventional Terror Threats

As terrorists seek to exploit the COVID-19 pandemic, counterterrorism authorities remain concerned about how malicious actors may escalate attacks or try to weaponize the coronavirus. Amid this backdrop, it is important to contextualize recent plots involving non-conventional terrorism, particularly bioweapons.

Earlier this year, a German court sentenced a Tunisian man and Islamic State sympathizer, Sief Allah H., to 10 years in prison for planning a biological attack involving ricin, a lethal poison.

His wife Yasmin is accused of helping Sief build the bomb and faces a separate trial.

The couple procured enough of the toxin to kill close to 13,500 people, the presiding judge for Sief’s trial said.

The CIA reportedly notified its German counterparts after discovering the couple’s online order for 3,300 castor beans, required for ricin production.

German counterterrorism authorities arrested the pair in 2018 and discovered 85 milligrams of ricin, a small, yet lethal amount. A year earlier, the couple had decided to bomb a large crowd, “to kill and wound the largest possible number of people,” prosecutors said before the trial.

Germany has faced a variety of Sunni and Shi’a extremist threats over the years. In January, police conducted raids across the country arresting multiple alleged Islamists suspected of planning major terrorist attacks. Raids targeted cells in Berlin and three other states including North Rhine-Westphalia – a state with a significant ...