Left-Wing German Terrorists Demand Release of Bradley Manning

But I thought lefties were all peace-loving and mild-mannered?

Germans are in fear of a return to the urban terror days of the Red Army Faction after leftists tried to blow up a railway station and derail high-speed express trains.

Explosives experts yesterday removed seven petrol bombs equipped with time detonators found by a railway worker in a tunnel leading into Berlin's central station.

A left-wing group calling itself Hekla claimed responsibility for the firebombs in an online statement.

The group condemned the German army's mission in Afghanistan and demanded the release of imprisoned US soldier Bradley Manning, who is accused of having leaked information to WikiLeaks.

The discovery followed an arson attack on signalling equipment along a line heading towards Hamburg which caused severe delays to the mainline service between the two cities.

The attacks have German politicians and police warning of a resurgence of the kind of left-wing terrorist that plagued West Germany 40 years ago.

Already this year 600 expensive cars have been torched in the city by anarchists.

Now the foiled bomb attacks indicate a ratcheting up of the campaign that, say police, will result in deaths unless they can be contained.

'We are experience a Renaissance of the Red Army Faction. The leftist terror is on the rise,' said Rainer Wendt, the chief of the German Police Union.

The Red Army Faction (RAF) - which grew out of the Baader-Meinhof terrorist clique - shot, bombed, kidnapped and terrorised West Germany in the Seventies.