What we know about Munich car ramming which has left dozens injured

Published

5 months ago

February 15, 2025

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A mother and her two-year-old daughter have died – and more than 30 people were injured – after a car drove into a crowd in Munich, police have said.

The incident took place on Thursday at a square close to the city’s central train station at around 10.30am (9.30am UK time), officials said.

Here is everything we know:

What happened?

The car – a cream-coloured Mini Cooper – was driven into the crowd on a street called Seidlstrasse in a central area of the city.

The crowd was taking part in a demonstration organised by a trade union, and a police car was following them as they walked, deputy police chief Christian Huber said.

“Then a vehicle approached it from behind,” he added.

“It approached the police car to overtake it, and then accelerated and drove into the back of the demonstration.”

The badly damaged Mini could be seen after the attack along with items of clothing and bags, a broken pram, a shoe and a pair of glasses scattered across the floor.

A man was arrested at the scene after police fired a shot at the car vehicle.

What we know about the victims

Police on Saturday said a 37-year-old mother from Munich and her daughter were the first fatalities from the incident.

Officials had earlier said a total of at least 36 people were injured.

In Friday’s news conference, they said one adult and one child were “very seriously injured” and eight other people were seriously injured.

Who is the suspect?

The man arrested was a 24-year-old Afghan national, Farhad N, who came to Germany as an asylum seeker.

Officials say Farhad N has lived in Munich since he arrived as an unaccompanied minor in 2016, and has no previous convictions.

The man’s asylum application was rejected, but he had not been forced to leave due to security concerns in Afghanistan and he was in Germany legally with a work permit.

Prosecutors say he is now under investigation on 36 counts of attempted murder as well as bodily harm and dangerous interference with road traffic.

Do we know the motives?

At the news conference on Friday, prosecutor Gabriele Tilmann said the suspect appeared to have had a “religious motivation”.

In questioning, he “gave an explanation that I would summarise as religious motivation,” she said, adding the suspect shouted “Allahu Akbar”, or “God is great”, to police and then prayed after his arrest.

She said he admitted to police that he “deliberately drove into the participants of the demonstration”.

“I’m very cautious about making hasty judgements, but based on everything we know at the moment, I would venture to speak of an Islamist motivation for the crime,” she added.

She clarified that the authorities had no reason to believe that the perpetrator was affiliated with any Islamist or terrorist organisations and that they had not found any evidence of him having accomplices.

She said they were now looking through his devices to see “whether other people knew about the attack before it happened, or if he was part of a network”.

The incident happened shortly before world leaders including US vice president JD Vance and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy arrived in the southern city for the Munich Security Conference, which started on Friday.

But police have said the incident is not thought to be related to the conference.

Incident comes amid immigration tensions

Security and immigration have been in sharp focus in Germany ahead of a federal election next week and following a string of violent attacks, with the far-right party AfD party doing well in polls.

Two months ago, a Saudi doctor was accused of driving his car into a crowd at a Christmas market in Magdeburg, killing six and injuring hundreds.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz described the Munich incident as a “terrible attack” and said the perpetrator “must be punished and he must leave the country”.

His comments come after the government said last year it was resuming flights for convicted criminals of Afghan nationality to their home country.

“It is very important for me to get the message across that anyone who commits crimes in Germany will not only be severely punished and sent to prison, they must also expect that they will not be able to continue their stay in Germany,” he said.

“That’s why I managed to get the government I lead to resume and carry out repatriations to Afghanistan, despite the lack of diplomatic relations,” he said.

He added: “We have already organised such a flight with criminals… we are also in the process of doing this in other cases. And not just once, but on an ongoing basis.

“This perpetrator cannot count on any leniency, he must be punished and he must leave the country.”

World

‘Horrific incident’ at sheriff training facility in LA – at least three people dead

Published

6 hours ago

July 18, 2025

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'Horrific incident' at sheriff training facility in LA - at least three people dead

At least three people have been killed after a “horrific incident” at a Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department training facility, officials have said.

A spokesperson for the department said there was an explosion at the Biscailuz Center Academy Training in east LA.

The incident was reported at around 7.30am local time (3.30pm UK time).

Aerial footage from local channel KABC-TV suggests the blast happened in a parking lot filled with sheriff patrol cars and box trucks.

Attorney general Pam Bondi wrote on X: “I just spoke to @USAttyEssayli about what appears to be a horrific incident that killed at least three at a law enforcement training facility in Los Angeles.

“Our federal agents are at the scene and we are working to learn more.”

California congressman Jimmy Sanchez said the explosion had “claimed the lives of at least three deputies”.

“My condolences to the families and everyone impacted by this loss,” he said.

The attorney general said in a follow-up post that agents from the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives are “on the ground to support”.

The mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass, said the LAPD bomb squad has also responded to the scene.

“The thoughts of all Angelenos are with all of those impacted by this blast,” she said.

California Governor Gavin Newsom has been briefed on the incident, his press office said in a post on X.

“The Governor’s Office of Emergency Services is in contact with the Sheriff’s Department and closely monitoring the situation, and has offered full state assistance,” it added.

The cause of the explosion is being investigated.

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World

Unmasked: The 18 Russian spies who mounted series of attacks on UK

Published

6 hours ago

July 18, 2025

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Unmasked: The 18 Russian spies who mounted series of attacks on UK

Dozens of Russian spies have been sanctioned by the government – including those responsible for targeting Yulia Skripal five years before her attempted murder in Salisbury.

The Foreign Office has announced that three units of the Russian military intelligence agency (GRU) have been hit with sanctions, alongside 18 military intelligence officers.

Politics latest: Diane Abbott suspended from Labour

GRU officers attempted to murder Yulia Skipal and her father Sergei using the deadly Novichok nerve agent in Salisbury.

The 18 military intelligence officers have been targeted because of a sustained campaign of malicious cyber activity over many years, including in the UK, the Foreign Office said.

The government also accused the GRU of using cyber and information operations to “sow chaos, division and disorder in Ukraine and across the world”.

One of the groups sanctioned, Unit 26165, conducted online reconnaissance to help target missile strikes against Mariupol, including the bombing of Mariupol Theatre where hundreds of civilians, including children, were murdered.

Other military officers who have been sanctioned previously targeted Yulia Skripal’s mobile phone with malicious malware known as X-Agent.

The Skripals had moved to the UK after Sergei Skripal became a double agent, secretly working for the UK. He was tried for high treason and imprisoned in Russia – and later exchanged in a spy swap.

But five years after Yulia’s phone was targeted, the pair were poisoned with the nerve agent, Novichok, in Salisbury. Russia has always denied being involved in the chemical attack.

Foreign Secretary David Lammy said: “GRU spies are running a campaign to destabilise Europe, undermine Ukraine’s sovereignty and threaten the safety of British citizens,” Foreign Secretary David Lammy said.

“The Kremlin should be in no doubt: we see what they are trying to do in the shadows and we won’t tolerate it.”

He said the UK was taking “decisive action” with the sanctions against Russian spies.

“Putin’s hybrid threats and aggression will never break our resolve. The UK and our allies’ support for Ukraine and Europe’s security is ironclad.”

Those sanctioned today include:

Aleksandr Vladimirovich Osadchuk

Yevgeniy Mikhaylovich Serbriakov

Anatoliy Sergeyvich Kovalev

Artem Valeryvich Ochichenko

The 161st Specialist Training Centre (TsPS) (Unit 29155) of the GRU

Vladislav Yevgenyevich Borovkov

Nikolay Aleksandrovich Korchagin

Yuriy Federovich Denisov

Vitaly Aleksandrovich Shevchenko

Ivan Sergeyevich Yermakov

Aleksey Viktorovich Lukashev

Sergey Sergeyevich Vasyuk

Andrey Eduardovich Baranov

Aleksey Sergeyevich Morenets

Sergey Aleksandrovich Morgachev

Artem Adreyevich Malyshev

Yuriy Leonidovich Shikolenko

Victor Borisovich Netyksho

Dmitriy Aleksandrovich Mikhaylov

African Initiative

Artyom Sergeevich Kureyev

Anna Sergeevna Zamaraeva

Victor Aleksandrovich Lukovenko

World

Antarctica’s oldest ice arrives in UK for analysis on climate shifts

Published

6 hours ago

July 18, 2025

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Antarctica's oldest ice arrives in UK for analysis on climate shifts

Antarctica’s oldest ice has arrived in the UK for analysis which scientists hope will reveal more about Earth’s climate shifts.

The ice was retrieved from depths of up to 2,800 metres at Little Dome C in East Antarctica as part of an international effort to “unlock the deepest secrets of Antarctica’s ice”.

The ice cores – cylindrical tubes of ancient ice – will be analysed at the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) in Cambridge, with the ultimate goal of reconstructing up to 1.5 million years of Earth’s climate history, significantly extending the current ice core record of 800,000 years.

The research is also expected to offer valuable context for predicting future climate change, Dr Liz Thomas, head of the ice cores team at the British Antarctic Survey, said.

Over the next few years, the samples will be analysed by different labs across Europe to gain understanding of Earth’s climate evolution and greenhouse gas concentrations.

Dr Thomas said: “It’s incredibly exciting to be part of this international effort to unlock the deepest secrets of Antarctica’s ice.

“The project is driven by a central scientific question: why did the planet’s climate cycle shift roughly one million years ago from a 41,000-year to a 100,000-year phasing of glacial-interglacial cycles?

“By extending the ice core record beyond this turning point, researchers hope to improve predictions of how Earth’s climate may respond to future greenhouse gas increases.”

The ice was extracted as part of the Beyond EPICA – Oldest Ice project, which is funded by the European Commission and brings together researchers from 10 European countries and 12 institutions.

“Our data will yield the first continuous reconstructions of key environmental indicators-including atmospheric temperatures, wind patterns, sea ice extent, and marine productivity-spanning the past 1.5 million years,” Dr Thomas said.

“This unprecedented ice core dataset will provide vital insights into the link between atmospheric CO₂ levels and climate during a previously uncharted period in Earth’s history, offering valuable context for predicting future climate change.”