After the knife attack in Mannheim, a seriously injured police officer is in hospital. He is in “extreme danger of death”. The suspected perpetrator was born in Afghanistan. He has led an inconspicuous life so far.
A man attacked several people with a knife on Mannheim’s market square on Friday afternoon. According to the police, a total of seven people were injured. Initial police reports said there were three injured. A police officer is among the injured. He is reportedly still fighting for his life. “His life is still in grave danger,” said a spokesman for the State Criminal Police Office (LKA) on Saturday morning.
The day after the knife attack on Mannheim’s market square, passers-by laid flowers.
The perpetrator shot by the police has been operated on and is currently unable to be questioned. The search for a motive has therefore not made any progress. “What concerns us most is the question of a motive,” said the State Criminal Police Office. The knife attack took place at an information stand run by the citizens’ movement “Pax Europa”.
Suspect came to Germany in 2013 according to SWR information
According to SWR information, the suspected perpetrator is a 25-year-old man from Afghanistan who is said to have come to Germany in 2013. He last lived in Heppenheim in Hesse – about 30 kilometers northeast of Mannheim. He apparently has a valid residence permit for Germany. He had apparently not come to the attention of state security until now.
His apartment in Heppenheim (Bergstraße district) was searched on Friday evening.
Identifying the man was difficult because he had no identification papers or personal belongings with him and was taken to hospital by police after being shot.
The State Criminal Police Office and the Karlsruhe Public Prosecutor’s Office announced on Friday afternoon that the police officer had wanted to “take an injured person out of the immediate danger zone” during the operation. The suspect attacked the officer and “stabbed him several times in the head area from behind” with his knife. Another police officer then stopped the attacker by firing a shot from his service weapon. Five other people also suffered injuries in connection with the knife attack. The severity of these injuries was not initially known.
Incident in Mannheim in front of the stand of the citizens’ movement “Pax Europa”
The citizens’ movement “Pax Europa” (BPE), at whose information stand the incident occurred, is a right-wing populist association based in Krefeld. It is considered critical of Islam. According to the treasurer of BPE, Stefanie Kizina, board member Michael Stürzenberger was also injured in the attack.
The website of “Pax Europa” states: “According to eyewitness reports, Stürzenberger suffered severe stab wounds to the face and leg.” Stürzenberger himself is now quoted there: The two-and-a-half-hour operation went well. He thanked the police officers, doctors, stewards and other helpers. He wished the injured police officer a speedy recovery.
Injured in attack in Mannheim – Who is Michael Stürzenberger?
Michael Stürzenberger and his environment within the Pax Europa movement are classified by the authorities in Bavaria, for example, as being Islamophobic and relevant to constitutional protection. In the past, Stürzenberger has, for example, repeatedly acted as a meeting leader for the citizens’ movement Pax Europa (BPE). He has also appeared as an author on the right-wing extremist website “Political Incorrect”. Stürzenberger spreads “Islamophobic statements,” according to the website of the Bavarian Information Center against Extremism. According to the information center, Stürzenberger reaches a large number of interested parties by creating YouTube videos. In 2022, he posted a total of more than 99 videos online on YouTube. These were viewed over 723,000 times. In Stürzenberger’s agitation, “Islamophobic statements stand out, which result in a fundamental rejection of the Islamic religion.” (Source: Bavarian Information Center against Extremism)
Motive for knife attack still unclear – Islamist act?
Whether the knife attack had a political background is the subject of the investigation. According to SWR terrorism expert Holger Schmidt, it is likely that it was a suspected Islamist act. “That is speculation, but speculation that is plausible,” said Schmidt. Stürzenberger has already been threatened several times in the past. The state security department of the Karlsruhe public prosecutor’s office, which is responsible for political crimes, is investigating.
The State Criminal Police Office said that numerous questions were still unanswered and were the subject of investigations. “What kind of knife is that? Where did it come from? Did he buy the knife?” – the answers to these questions will also help to determine whether the arrested man planned the crime or whether it was a spontaneous attack.
BPE treasurer Stefanie Kizina spoke of a “terrorist attack”. “What happened today was a terrorist attack – not a knife attack,” she said. The attack was specifically aimed at Michael Stürzenberger.
Photo gallery
The Mannheim market square after the knife attack
Rescue workers and a rescue helicopter were also deployed on Friday afternoon. The market square was cordoned off and the police erected privacy screens.
Video on social networks: Attacker apparently stopped by police weapon
Video recordings of the incident are circulating on social networks, for example on the X platform (formerly Twitter). It shows a person attacking and injuring a man with a knife. Police officers arrive and try to separate the people. Then it can be seen how the attacker stabs a police officer and injures him in the head. Finally, the attacker is apparently brought to the ground by a shot from a police weapon. The video shows several police officers with service weapons in their hands.
Chancellor Scholz: “Images from Mannheim are terrible”
Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) was shocked by the violent act in Mannheim. It was “terrible,” Scholz wrote on X on Friday. His thoughts were with the victims. “Violence is absolutely unacceptable in our democracy. The perpetrator must be severely punished.”
Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser (SPD) said the images of “this brutal act of violence are shocking.” She hopes the victims will make a full recovery. “I would like to express my sincere thanks to the police who intervened immediately and to the doctors and rescue workers who are fighting to save the lives of the victims of this terrible act.” If the investigations reveal an Islamist motive, “that would be further confirmation of the great danger posed by Islamist acts of violence that we have warned about.”
Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier was outraged: “I condemn the crime in Mannheim in the strongest possible terms!”, his spokeswoman Cerstin Gammelin wrote on Friday on Steinmeier’s behalf on the Platform X. “There must be no room for violence in our democracy – violence destroys democracy. Freedom of expression is a precious asset.” He wished the injured a speedy recovery and thanked the police for their quick intervention.
There must be no place for violence in our democracy – violence destroys democracy.
Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier
Prime Minister Kretschmann thanks police for quick intervention
Baden-Württemberg’s Prime Minister Winfried Kretschmann (Greens) said he was shocked by the knife attack in Mannheim. He thanked the police for their quick intervention. Kretschmann said on Friday: “All our thoughts are with the injured and their families, we sincerely hope that everyone will recover.” Kretschmann said he was deeply shocked that a police officer was seriously injured during the operation. “Anyone who attacks police officers is attacking our democratic constitutional state.”
State Interior Minister Thomas Strobl (CDU) also reacted with concern to the incident in Mannheim. “Today, everyone was shown in a terrible way what great, serious dangers are associated with the police profession,” he said.
Mannheim Mayor Specht “shaken and shocked”
Mannheim’s mayor Christian Specht (CDU) was also deeply affected by the knife attack on the market square.
This brutal attack shakes and shocks us, it leaves us speechless.
Christian Specht (CDU) Mayor of the City of Mannheim
Specht said his thoughts were with the injured police officer and the other victims. At the same time, he called on people not to speculate about the background of the crime, but instead to wait for the results of the investigation.
The chairman of the police union (GdP) in Mannheim, Thomas Mohr, said he was “shocked” by the attack on his colleague. The deputy federal chairman of the GdP, Michael Mertens, said the attack showed that police officers “must expect massive outbreaks of violence and attempted murder at any time during their operations. The danger is present and real.”
The chairman of the Conference of Interior Ministers (IMK), Michael Stübgen (CDU), viewed the knife attack in Mannheim as evidence of the brutalization of society. “The motive of the knife attacker is now being investigated, and the security authorities will have to draw their conclusions from this,” Brandenburg’s Interior Minister told the newspapers of the Funke Media Group. “This terrible act also makes it clear once again how brutal our society is.”
Markus Frohnmaier, state chairman of the AfD in Baden-Württemberg, criticized the government after the attack became known: “In Germany, there have been repeated brutal knife and axe attacks for several years by people who should not be in our country at all,” Frohnmaier said in a statement. The German security authorities are apparently “overwhelmed.”
Broadcast on Fri., 31.5.2024 19:30, SWR Aktuell Baden-Württemberg, SWR BW