A car ploughed into a busy outdoor Christmas market in the eastern German city of Magdeburg on Friday evening, killing at least two people and injuring at least 60 others in what authorities suspect was an attack.
One of the dead was confirmed to be a young child.
The car was driven through the busy outdoor Christmas market at around 7pm.
The driver of the car was arrested, dpa reported, citing unidentified government officials in the state of Saxony-Anhalt.
The suspect was not known to German authorities as an Islamic extremist, dpa reported, citing the security officials.
Saxony-Anhalt’s interior minister, Tamara Zieschang, told reporters that the suspect is a 50-year-old Saudi doctor who first came to Germany in 2006.
He has been practising medicine in Bernburg, about 23 miles (36km) south of Magdeburg, she said.
“As things stand, he is a lone perpetrator, so that as far as we know there is no further danger to the city,” Saxony-Anhalt’s governor, Reiner Haseloff, said at a news conference.
Mr Haseloff said the two people who were confirmed to have died were an adult and a small child, but that he could not rule out further deaths because so many people were seriously injured.
“But that is speculation now. Every human life that has fallen victim to this attack is a terrible tragedy and one human life too many,” he said.
“It’s a terrible tragedy — this is a catastrophe for the city of Magdeburg and for the state, and for Germany generally as well,” Mr Haseloff said. “It is really one of the worst things one can imagine, particularly in connection with what a Christmas market should bring.”
At least 60 people were injured, including 15 who were hurt very seriously, according to government officials and the city government’s website.
It said more than 30 people had injuries of medium severity and 16 were lightly injured.
Regional government spokesperson Matthias Schuppe and city spokesperson Michael Reif said they suspected it was a deliberate act.
Earlier, Mr Reif said there were “numerous injured”, but he did not give a precise figure.
“The pictures are terrible,” he said. “My information is that a car drove into the Christmas market visitors, but I can’t yet say from what direction and how far.”
Magdeburg’s University Hospital said it was taking care of 10 to 20 patients but was preparing for more, dpa reported.
The sounds of sirens from first responders clashed with the market’s holiday decorations.
Footage from the scene of a cordoned-off part of the market showed debris on the ground.
The car drove into the market at around 7pm, when it was busy with holiday shoppers.
“This is a terrible event, particularly now in the days before Christmas,” Saxony-Anhalt governor Reiner Haseloff said.
Mr Haseloff told dpa that he was on his way to Magdeburg but could not immediately give any information on victims or what was behind the incident.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz posted on X, formerly Twitter: “My thoughts are with the victims and their relatives. We stand beside them and beside the people of Magdeburg.”
Magdeburg, which is west of Berlin, is the state capital of Saxony-Anhalt and has about 240,000 residents.
The suspected attack comes eight years after an attack on a Christmas market in Berlin.
On December 19 2016, an Islamic extremist drove through a crowded Christmas with a truck, killing 13 people and injuring dozens more. The attacker was killed days later in a shootout in Italy.
German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said late last month that there were no concrete indications of a danger to Christmas markets this year, but that it was wise to be vigilant.
The attack reverberated beyond Magdeburg. After a football match between Bayern Munich and Leipzig, Bayern chief executive Jan-Christian Dreesen asked fans at the club’s stadium to observe a minute’s silence.
Magdeburg resident Dorin Steffen told German news agency dpa that she was at a concert in a nearby church when she heard the sirens. The noise was so loud “you had to assume that something terrible had happened”.
She called the attack “a dark day” for the city.
“We are shaking,” Ms Steffen said. “Full of sympathy for the relatives, also in the hope that nothing has happened to our relatives, friends and acquaintances.”
Mr Haseloff called it a catastrophe for the city, state and country, adding that flags will be lowered to half-staff in Saxony-Anhalt and that the federal government planned to do the same.
Magdeburg Mayor Simone Borris said officials plan to arrange a memorial at the city’s cathedral on Saturday.
