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At least 28 people were injured, some critically, after a car drove into a crowd in central Munich Thursday in what Germany’s Chancellor Olaf Scholz described as a “terrible attack,” hours before world leaders were set to arrive in the city for a security conference.
The suspected attacker was a 24-year-old Afghan asylum seeker who has been detained, officials said, with Scholz saying he “must be punished and he must leave the country.”
The incident took place at a trade union rally being held about a mile away from the Munich Security Conference venue, where Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and US Vice President JD Vance are set to gather on Friday.
It also comes as Germany prepares to vote in a snap election set for Feb. 23, with immigration a topline issue.
Bavarian State Premier Markus Söder said the incident was ”suspected to be an attack,” adding that, “This shows something’s got to change in Germany.”
Munich Mayor Dieter Reiter said he was ”deeply shocked″ by the incident, adding that children were among the injured.
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Police said the driver was a 24 year-old Afghanistan asylum seeker already known to them for theft and drug offenses.
The leader of far-right political party Alternative for Germany, which is currently polling second ahead of the country’s Feb. 23 election, seized on the attack as evidence of the need for a ”turning point″ in migration policy.
The incident will likely fuel polarization over immigration in the run-up to the election, and could push some mainstream lawmakers to adopt hardline stances: After a January attack by a rejected asylum seeker, the opposition Christian Democratic Union broke a longstanding taboo against working with the AfD to pass a non-binding motion urging the government to restrict migration.
Immigrant rights activists say these incidents appear to have spurred retaliatory attacks against migrants. A Christmas market car-ramming attack in December involving a Saudi man led to an uptick in violent assaults, Politico reported.