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Germany is home to between 3,000 and 5,000 potential Islamic suicide attackers, a senior security official touted as the country's next interior minister has been quoted as saying.

Guenther Beckstein, currently interior minister in the German state of Bavaria, said on Monday in an interview with the online Netzeitung newspaper that he was worried small cells of "fanatics" could prepare attacks without detection.

"In Germany we have between 3,000 and 5,000 of these Islamists who are prepared to use violence and do not shrink from suicide attacks," Beckstein was quoted as saying.

He said they included individuals who are ready to fight in Iraq and Chechnya.

Beckstein is widely tipped to become federal interior minister, the country's top security post, if opposition conservatives win Sunday's parliamentary elections.

Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's Social Democrats are trailing in the polls.

Beckstein, a member of the conservative Bavaria-only Christian Social Union, argues that security laws toughened after the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States are still too soft.

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