Three killed, five injured in attack at Solingen festival celebrations in Germany

German Press Agency

DUSSELDORF, Germany – Three people have been killed and at least five seriously injured in a knife attack at the 650th anniversary celebrations of the city of Solingen in western Germany, according to the police.

The attacker is still on the run, a police spokeswoman in Dusseldorf said shortly after midnight local time.

Police sources said that the case was no longer classified as a rampage, but as an attack.

Armed officers are stationed at the scene and have cordoned off large areas of the city and set up privacy screens.

A man started stabbing people indiscriminately at around 9:45 p.m. local time on Friday, according to a report, in Fronhof, a marketplace in the city center where a stage was set up for live music.

The festival was called to a halt and sirens could be heard around the city center.

There were helicopters overhead and ambulances at the scene.

Thousands of people were leaving the area, after the authorities called on residents to remain calm and go home, the local Solinger Tageblatt newspaper reported.

“People left the square in shock, but calmly,” said Philipp Müller, one of the festival’s co-organizers, according to a report in the Solinger Tageblatt newspaper.

A reporter for the newspaper called the atmosphere “frightening,” saying it had changed within the space of a few minutes from an exuberant celebratory mood to shock, with tearful festival-goers passing her.

The state interior minister of North Rhine-Westphalia, Herbert Reul, is at the scene of the crime to assess the situation as emergency workers respond to the incident.

Solingen’s Mayor Tim Kurzbach expressed his shock following the incident.

“Tonight all of us in Solingen are in shock, fright and great sadness,” he wrote on the city’s Facebook page.

“We all wanted to celebrate our city anniversary together and now we have to mourn the dead and injured,” he said.

“I pray for all those who are still fighting for their lives,” he wrote.

He also expressed his sympathies to those that witnessed the attack, before thanking emergency services and the police for their service.

“I ask that if you believe, pray with me and if you don’t, then hope with me,” the mayor said.

The state premier of North Rhine-Westphalia, Hendrik Wüst, said the state was united in shock and grief.

“In these dark hours, the hearts and minds of the people of our state and beyond are in Solingen, where an act of brutal and senseless violence has struck at the heart of our state,” he said in a post on X.

He said the whole of North Rhine-Westphalia stands by the people of Solingen, especially the victims and their families.

“A big thank you goes to the many rescue workers and our police who are fighting for human lives in these minutes,” he said.

German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach also spoke of emergency personnel in a post on X.

“Hopefully rescue workers will manage to save those who were injured and the police will be able to catch the cowardly and pathetic perpetrator on the run,” Lauterbach wrote.

The event, a Festival of Diversity, began on Friday to mark the 650th anniversary of Solingen and was due to continue through to Sunday.

All the events planned for Saturday and Sunday have now been canceled, the city announced.

The city center was set to become a large festival mile according to posters ahead of the event that promised music, cabaret, acrobatics, arts and crafts, entertainment for children and more.

The incident comes after the Interior Minister Nancy Faeser announced laws would be tightened so people can only carry knives with blades of up to six centimeters in public, rather than the previous 12 centimeters, plus a ban on handling dangerous switchblade knives.

The German government is planning to introduce legislation stiffening laws on the carrying of weapons, she said in mid August after a spate of incidents involving knives.

The new law will “further restrict the carrying of knives in public,” Faeser said at the time.

Alongside the limits on blade lengths, there will be a total ban on switchblades or flick knives.