Zschäpe to break her silence

Zschäpe is expected to break her silence this Wednesday in a Munich court, which has met more than 240 times over the past two-and-a-half years examining her leading role with the neo-Nazi National Socialist Underground (NSU) terror group, the news magazine "Der Spiegel" reported.

As the main defendant in the NSU trials, her testimony could answer many unknown questions about the underground group, which prosecutors have blamed for 10 murders between 2000 and 2007.

Zschäpe is the only known surviving member of an alleged killer trio. The gang's two other members, Uwe Mundlos and Uwe Böhnhardt, died in 2011 in an apparent murder-suicide while hiding in a camper van after a botched bank robbery.

Zschäpe will reportedly not speak directly to the court, but rather her testimony will be read by her new defense attorney, Mathias Grasel. The court, federal prosecutors and four co-defendants accused of assisting the group and their defense attorneys will be unable to ask questions.

Zschäpe faces 10 murder charges, two bombing charges and 15 robbery charges for her role as a member of the NSU trio that terrorized immigrants in Germany for roughly a decade.

The victims were all residents in Germany - eight men of Turkish origin, a Greek migrant, and a German policewoman.

The case has generated heated debate in Germany, primarily because the NSU cell went undetected for over a decade despite authorities having dozens of informants in the country's right-wing extremist scene.

The German Bundestag as well as state legislatures have launched multiple investigations to shed light on the NSU, but the probes have opened up as many questions as they have answered.