No political motive behind carnival incident
German authorities are ruling out that the man who plowed an automobile into a carnival parade on Monday, injuring some 60 persons including children, was driven by a political or ideological motive, Germany's Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reported on Wednesday.
A spokesman for prosecutors said they were still investigating all possibilities.German prosecutors and police said the suspect, a 29-year-old German citizen, had been arrested on suspicion of attempted homicide. The motive remained unclear and investigators were looking at all possibilities, they added.
"This is a terrible day, this is an awful deed," said Peter Beuth, interior minister of Hesse, the western German state where Volkmarsen is located. A third of these injured were children, he said, and police still had no indication of the possible motive."It usually is assumed that it had been intentional," police spokesman Henning Hinn said at the scene.
where debris from the carnival littered the ground and a silver Mercedes-Benz car that appeared to have been involved was taped off by police.He said eight to 10 of around 30 persons injured were seriously hurt. "Among those who are seriously injured are children, unfortunately," he added. Bild newspaper said a number of the injuries were life-threatening.
German news website HNA cited witnesses saying the person seemed to have targeted children and had driven "at full throttle" in to the crowd, which had gathered for a traditional procession prior to the Christian season of Lent."Individuals were coming towards me, crying," Bild newspaper quoted local county commissioner Reinhard Kubat as saying.
"There were mainly injured children in the pub, but also the elderly. Children came up if you ask me and said it sounded like 'Plop, plop, plop' whenever the car ran over a person."Police called off all carnival parades in Hesse as a precautionary measure, but said these were unaware of any danger elsewhere in Germany. "We've no specific indications of a continuing threat," police said.
