Police call off annual parade after crowd struck by vehicle in Tiergarten park.
A van drove into a crowd gathered for Berlin’s Pride celebrations on Saturday, killing one person and injuring at least 16 others, forcing police to shut down the event hours after it began, the Associated Press (AP) reported.
Police said the van entered the city’s Tiergarten park, close to where the Pride march had passed earlier in the day, striking several people before crashing into a tree.
WHAT DO WE KNOW ABOUT THE ATTACK?
Police said some of the injured had life-threatening wounds, and urged people at the scene to leave immediately as ambulances and fire crews responded.
Officer Florian Nath said in a video posted by Berlin police that authorities were carrying out an intensive search for possible suspects. Police spokesperson Alexander Klute later told AP that officials did not yet know anything about a possible motive.
Emergency workers set up a helicopter landing pad near the Reichstag to help move the injured to hospital, according to Reuters.
IS A SUSPECT KNOWN?
Hours after the attack, many details remained unclear. A Berlin police spokesperson said a suspected attacker had been identified as part of the city’s “Islamist scene,” though no arrest had been made by the time of reporting, according to Reuters.
“We have now identified a suspected perpetrator. Measures against this suspected perpetrator, who has not yet been arrested, are underway.
HOW HAVE OFFICIALS RESPONDED?
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said he and the interior minister would push to ensure the attack was fully investigated and those responsible punished, Reuters reported. Berlin Mayor Kai Wegner called it an attack on the city’s free and open society, saying the rally that followed a peaceful Pride march had been struck in a brutal way.
Hundreds of thousands of people had gathered in Berlin under sunny skies to take part in the parade, known in Germany as Christopher Street Day, one of Europe’s largest LGBTQ+ celebrations. More than 80 floats had taken part before the attack cut the event short.
The parade this year carried the theme “taking a stand is hot,” organisers said, a response to rising hostility toward queer people in Germany. Earlier in the day, one person was arrested for resisting police at a far-right counterprotest against the event.
With inputs from AP and Reuters
