One Person Dead, Several Injured In Germany As Car Hits Crowd

At least one person died and several were injured after a car drove into a crowd in the German city of Mannheim near Frankfurt.

A suspect has been arrested, local police said Monday in a statement. An operation is underway in Mannheim’s city center and citizens should avoid the area, it said. It didn’t specify how many people were injured.

Tabloid Bild Zeitung reported that two people died and at least 14 were injured. German news service dpa reported the suspect is a German citizen.

The incident happened less than three weeks after a 24-year old Afghan male drove into a labor union demonstration in Munich and injured dozens of people. Two people, including a two-year old child, died in hospital after the attack.

The German government has been under pressure to boost domestic security after several violent attacks in recent months. The incidents triggered calls for stricter immigration controls and stoked political controversy in Berlin as in several cases the perpetrators were immigrants.

A stabbing in the city of Solingen last year left three people dead and an attacker drove a vehicle into a Christmas market in Magdeburg in December, killing six people and injuring hundreds more.

A stabbing of two people including a two-year-old child in the city of Aschaffenburg in January added more fuel to the political discourse as parties moved immigration to the center of their campaigning ahead of the Feb. 23 federal election.

The far-right, anti-immigration Alternative for Germany party, or AfD, emerged as the second most-popular party in the country in the national vote just over a week ago.