Investigators have found fingerprints of Tunisian suspect Anis Amri on the truck used to kill 12 people in the Berlin Christmas market attack on Monday.

Islamic State has claimed responsibility for the attack in which a truck smashed through wooden huts selling gifts, mulled wine and sausages on Monday evening. It was the deadliest attack on German soil since 1980.

Germany's chief federal prosecutor also confirmed the arrests of four people who had contact with Anis Amri, the Tunisian suspect in the Berlin Christmas market attack that killed 12 people, German newspaper Bild said.

The chief federal prosecutor was not immediately available for comment.

German police commandos raided two apartments in the Berlin district of Kreuzberg late yesterday but did not find Amri.

It was also revealed today that fingerprints of the Tunisian suspect were found  on the door of the truck that ploughed through the crowds.

Islamic State has claimed responsibility for the attack in which the truck smashed through wooden huts selling gifts, mulled wine and sausages.

Amri's father and security sources told Tunisia's Radio Mosaique that he had left Tunisia seven years ago as an illegal immigrant and had spent time in prison in Italy.

In Duesseldorf, Ralf Jaeger, interior minister of the western state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW), said the Tunisian appeared to have arrived in Germany in July 2015 and his asylum application had been rejected.

He seemed to have used different names and had been identified by security agencies as being in contact with an Islamist network. He had mainly lived in Berlin since February, but was recently in NRW, Jaeger added.