German police scour a city for a knife attacker who killed 3 at a community festival
Special police units on Saturday joined the search for an unknown knifeman who cut the throats of revelers at a crowded festival in the western German city of Solingen, killing three people and wounding at least eight others, four of them seriously.
A 15-year-old boy was arrested early Saturday. Police said he was suspected of knowing about the planned attack and not informing authorities, but he was not the attacker.
Markus Caspers, from the counterterrorism section of the public prosecutors office, told a news conference Saturday that authorities have not found the perpetrator.
“So far we have not been able to identify a motive, but looking at the overall circumstances, we cannot rule out” the possibility of terrorism, Caspers said, though he did not offer further details.
Thorsten Fleiss from the German police, who was the chief of operations Friday night, said that police are conducting searches and investigations in the entire state of North Rhine Westphalia.
The three people who died were two men aged 67 and 56 and a 56-year-old woman, authorities said.
Police warned people to stay vigilant even as well-wishers started to leave flowers at the scene. Authorities established an online portal where witnesses could upload video and any other information relevant to the attack.
People alerted police shortly after 9:30 p.m. Friday to an attacker having wounded several people with a knife on a central square, the Fronhof. Police said they believe the stabbings were carried out by a lone attacker and gave no information about the identities of the victims.
At least eight people, some of them children, were injured in stabbings in northwest England, authorities said. A suspect was in custody.
“Last night our hearts were torn apart. We in Solingen are full of horror and grief. What happened yesterday in our city has hardly let any of us sleep,” the mayor of Solingen, Tim Kurzbach, told reporters Saturday near the scene of the attack.
The “Festival of Diversity,” marking the city’s 650th anniversary, began Friday and was supposed to run through Sunday, with several stages in central streets offering live music, cabaret and acrobatics.
The attack took place in the crowd in front of one stage. Hours later, the stage lights were still on as police and forensic investigators looked for clues in the cordoned-off square.
One of the festival organizers, Philipp Müller, appeared on stage Friday and asked festivalgoers to “go calmly; please keep your eyes open, because unfortunately the perpetrator hasn’t been caught.”
The rest of the festival was canceled. Solingen, with about 160,000 residents, is near the bigger cities of Cologne and Duesseldorf.
French media are hailing ‘the hero with a backpack’ who grappled with an attacker during a stabbing rampage that critically wounded four children.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Saturday that the attacker must be caught quickly and punished with the full force of the law.
“The attack in Solingen is a terrible event that has shocked me greatly. An attacker has brutally killed several people. I have just spoken to Solingen’s mayor, Tim Kurzbach. We mourn the victims and stand by their families,” Scholz said on X.
German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier also spoke to the mayor of Solingen on Saturday morning.
“The heinous act in Solingen shocks me and our country. We mourn those killed and worry about those injured and I wish them strength and a speedy recovery from all my heart,” Steinmeier said in a statement Saturday.
“The perpetrator needs to be brought to justice. Let’s stand together — against hatred and violence.”
There has been concern about increased knife violence in Germany, and Interior Minister Nancy Faeser recently proposed toughening weapons laws to allow only knives with a blade measuring up to nearly 2.4 inches to be carried in public, rather than the length of 4.7 inches that is currently allowed.
Associated Press writer Niemann reported from Solingen, Liechtenstein from Vienna.
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