Three people were killed and four others seriously injured during a stabbing rampage at the Diversity Festival in the German city of Solingen on Friday night, police said. The sole suspect remains at large.
According to eyewitnesses, the attacker began randomly attacking people at around 9:45 pm local time at Fronhof square in Solingen, where many had arrived to celebrate the city’s 650th anniversary.
Police began a search for the suspect who fled the scene. “We currently have no information about his whereabouts,” said a police spokesman.
Police did not provide any description of the suspect. According to Bild, witnesses described the perpetrator as “a man of Arab appearance.”
The crime scene was cordoned off, with heavily armed police and several ambulances present in the area.
“We are all in shock,” Solingen Mayor Tim Kurzbach said. “We wanted to celebrate our city’s anniversary together and how we have to mourn the dead and the injured.”
BREAKING NEWS: At least 3 people have been stabbed to death at a “diversity festival” in Solingen, Germany 🇩🇪People are still receiving CPR treatment at the scene, but several bodies have also been covered with sheets.@BILD eyewitness reports say an “Arab-looking man” began stabbing people photo.twitter.com/2443bpZZjR
— Visegrád 24 (@visegrad24) August 23, 2024
A city with a population of almost 160,000, Solingen is located in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia in western Germany, not far from the larger cities of Dusseldorf and Cologne.
Germany has seen several knife attacks in recent years. In 2021, a Somali national armed with a kitchen knife killed three people inside a shop in Wurzburg. In June 2024, an Afghan asylum seeker attacked people at a small rally organized by an anti-Islam group in Mannheim. He injured six people, including a police officer who later succumbed to his injuries.
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