Three people were killed and four others seriously wounded in a stabbing attack at a festival on Friday night in the western German city of Solingen, police said.
They said that at around 10 p.m. (2000 GMT) a single, unidentified man attacked multiple people and that the perpetrator was still at large.
“It tears my heart apart that there was an attack on our city. I have tears in my eyes when I think of those we have lost,” Solingen Mayor Tim-Oliver Kurzbach said in a statement. “I pray for all those who are still fighting for their lives.”
Fatal stabbings and shootings in Germany are relatively uncommon. The police said the attack occurred at a festival to honour the town’s 650th anniversary.
Solingen is in North Rhine-Westphalia state, Germany’s most populous and bordering the Netherlands.
The state’s interior minister, Herbert Reul, visited the scene, telling reporters it was a targeted attack on human life but declining to speculate on the motive.
The attack occurred at the Fronhof, the mayor’s statement said, a market square where live bands were playing.
The German government has been aiming to toughen rules on knives that can be carried in public by reducing the length allowed.