Europe has been caught up in a night of horror as multiple suspected terror attacks rocked the continent. One of those incidents involved a delivery truck ploughing into a Christmas market in Breitscheidplatz, at the heart of Berlin, killing 12 people and injuring 48 in the process. The nightmarish scene was reminiscent of a similar terror attack that occurred in Nice, France last July when a commercial truck ran into scores of people celebrating the country’s Bastille Day festivities.

Media outlets in Germany are reporting that the driver has been identified as a 23-year-old Pakistani asylum seeker named Navel B., who arrived in Germany in February 2016 as a refugee. The motive behind the attack has yet to be fully determined but the German police issued a statement, saying that its “investigators are working on the assumption that the truck was intentionally driven into the crowd at the Christmas market on Breitscheidplatz.”

”All police measures concerning the suspected terror attack at Breitscheidplatz are being taken with great speed and the necessary care,” the authorities added.

Investigations on the attack also revealed a dead body inside the cab of the truck, who some believe to be the original driver of the truck when it was hijacked by the perpetrator. The dead body has been identified as a Polish national who was in the middle of transporting cargo when the truck was jacked by the suspect. Ariel Zurawski, the Polish owner of the truck, later confirmed that his driver was missing and had been unreachable shortly before the attack happened.

The suspect was arrested by police after reportedly fleeing the scene on foot.

Continue after the jump to read the full story.

Why it matters

Is it just me, or is everyone ready to call 2016 a day and move on to the next year? I know it’s been a tremendous year in the automotive circle and the sharp growth and development of new technologies are welcome changes. But in a much bigger scale, 2016 has arguably been one of the roughest years in history.

The fact that we’re mere weeks away from the new year and something like this is still happening is shining an even bigger light on how tough this year has been. More concrete details are still being gathered at this point so it’s hard to speculate on what the intent of that 23-year-old Pakistani refugee had when he drove a stolen truck into innocent people.

It’s a horrible thing to happen so close to the holidays, and when you combine that with the separate terror attacks in Turkey and Switzerland, none of this makes sense. It’s tragic. It’s depressing. And it should stop.

I don’t know if it will, but I’m hoping it does at some point. Far too many innocent lives are being taken so needlessly for stupid reasons. It’s a dark time for a lot of people who got themselves involved in these tragedies and as a society, the only thing we can do is send our condolences and hope that they get through it.

On behalf of everyone here at TopSpeed, our thoughts and prayers go out to everyone affected by this incident in Berlin, and all others happening all over the world.