A Syrian terror suspect held in Germany over a bomb plot has strangled himself by tying his shirt to the bars of his prison cell.

Jaber Albakr had been under police surveillance.

His suicide on Wednesday evening will likely add pressure on German security officials and make the investigation into the suspected bombing plot more difficult.

"This should not have happened even though we did everything we could to prevent it," said Saxony's justice minister, Sebastian Gemkow.

Albakr, a 22-year-old Syrian refugee who was granted asylum after arriving in Germany last year, took his life on Wednesday evening


A trainee guard in Leipzig prison, where he was held, checked on him at 7.30pm on Wednesday, said Rolf Jacob, the head of the prison.

The guard returned for another check 15 minutes later - only to find Albakr strangled on the front of his cell.

Image: The prison in Leipzig, eastern Germany, where Jaber Albakr committed suicide

Albakr had destroyed a lighting fixture in his cell two days ago, but Mr Jacob said that "was not interpreted as a suicide attempt."

He was considered a suicide risk, but authorities who had assessed him when he entered the prison this week did not consider the risk "acute", said Mr Jacob.

Details of the suicide emerged in a press conference in Dresden.

Albakr had been arrested on Monday morning after two days on the run.

He had managed to escape a raid on Saturday at his flat in the city Chemnitz, where police found "several hundred grams" of a volatile explosive - enough to cause significant damage - and a bomb vest.

On Monday, he was handed over to police by three other Syrians who recognised him from photos released as part of a nationwide manhunt.

Image: Jaber Albakr's flat in Chemnitz after the 8 October raid

Albakr had approached the trio for help, but instead of sheltering him, they tied him up and called the authorities.

The suspect had been under surveillance by German domestic intelligence since last month.

German authorities have said they believe he had links to the Islamic State group and was thought to be planning to attack a Berlin airport, possibly as soon as this week.

He had been searching online for bomb-making instructions and "equipment for jihad" since at least the beginning of the month.

Officials said Albakr's death would make the investigation into whether he had accomplices in the thwarted plot far more difficult.

"We don't know yet if there were people pulling the strings," said Klaus Fleischmann, chief public prosecutor in the state of Saxony.

State authorities had already been criticised for allowing Albakr to slip through their fingers during the first raid.

Albakr was originally from Damascus and was among 890,000 migrants granted asylum after entering the country in 2015.

German media have reported that after his initial arrival, Albakr later returned to Syria through Turkey and then came back to Germany.