Germany: 3 teens on trail; accuse of jihadist bomb attack on Indian wedding

Berlin: Three teenage boys accused of a jihadist bomb attack on an Indian wedding that left a Sikh priest badly wounded went on trial in Germany on Wednesday.

All three extremists of 16 years-old at the time, allegedly set off a home-made bomb in April outside a prayer hall where a Sikh wedding was taking place, also leaving two others with lesser injuries.

The accused youths were born in Germany, had met on social media after being radicalised by ultra-extreme Salafist Muslims, and got together to accomplish the attack in the western city limits of Essen.

Prosecutors allegation that they had sought to kill "non-believers" with a device they had built from a fire extinguisher shell and chemicals ordered from online shopping site Amazon.

All three accused face charges including attempted murder and causing grievous bodily harm.

Neriman Yaman, the mother of one of the accused, the now 17-year-old Yusuf, has described her torment as she watched her young son become radicalised in the book "My Son, the Salafist".

The Turkish-born author describes how she pursued help from mosques and state authorities as her son from age 14 turned to a fundamentalist version of Islam.

She says Yusuf started speaking in verses, watched Arabic-language preachers online, joined a group that handed out Korans on the street and married a teenage girl wearing a burqa.

Yusuf even joined a de-radicalisation programme run by the German domestic security agency BfV, she recounts, but allegedly went on to commit the attack anyway.

"As parents we were powerless," she later told journalists. 

"The another side was stronger than us ... The only comfort in this huge misfortune is that no-one has died."