The Afghan migrant who stabbed a two-year-old boy and a passerby to death in a German park was supposed to have left the country.
The knifeman, aged 28, ambushed a nursery group and killed the boy of Moroccan descent as well as the 41-year-old German man who tried to protect the children in Schoental Park, in the Bavarian town of Aschaffenburg at around 11.45am.
According to Spiegel, the perpetrator is a male asylum seeker called Enamullah O. who reportedly lives in an asylum accommodation in the region and is said to have mental problems.
Enamullah O. came to Germany in November 2022, but was not granted asylum and announced on December 4, 2024, that he would voluntary leave the country, tabloid Bild reports.
‘As a result, on December 11, the [ministry for immigration and asylum] finally closed the asylum procedure and asked the person concerned to leave the country,’ Bavaria’s Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann told a press conference.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Wednesday he would demand to know why the Afghan suspect in a deadly knife attack had been able to stay in the country.
‘The authorities must explain as quickly as possible why the attacker was even still in Germany,’ Scholz said in a statement reacting to the devastating attack.
The knifeman was arrested near the scene and the kitchen knife allegedly used in the attack has been seized.
Investigators say he had already shown psychological problems in the past and had been ‘noticed for violent crimes at least three times in the past’, according to Herrmann.
The suspect had allegedly been following a day care group of five young children before launching the attack, according to Main-Echo.
An eyewitness told the Main-Echo newspaper that the arrested man was taken away ‘in a headlock.’
Cops confirmed that two people had died while three others were injured in the attack, and are now being treated in hospital.
The knifeman also stabbed a two-year-old Syrian girl in the neck three times and stabbed another passerby aged 61 in the chest several times. A teacher also broke her arm while fleeing, according to Bild.
‘Two people were fatally injured,’ police said, while ‘two seriously injured people are receiving treatment in hospital. The suspect was arrested in the immediate vicinity of the crime scene.’
A second person arrested was a witness and was being questioned, police said, adding that there were no indications of other suspects as well as no further danger to the public.
Police also said investigations into the ‘background of the crime’ were ongoing.
Main-Echo reported that teachers from an Aschaffenburg daycare center were out on a local trip to Schoental with five small children.
‘The attacker is said to have followed this group. The teachers noticed this and they wanted to leave Schoental,’ the news site said.
‘When they wanted to leave, the man is said to have attacked the group with a knife. He was apparently specifically targeting the children.
‘One teacher suffered injuries and is now in hospital, another is receiving psychological care. The other children have now been picked up by their parents and are receiving psychological care’.
In a press release following the incident, Lower Franconia Police confirmed: ‘The Aschaffenburg police, with the support of surrounding departments, launched a large-scale search for the suspect immediately after the incident became known.
‘The suspected weapon used in the crime, a knife, was confiscated,’ police said.
The motive for the attack remains unclear and police have asked that people refrain from speculation.
A large area was cordoned off covering Schoental Park, police said, and rail traffic in the area was temporarily suspended.
Train services in the town were temporarily interrupted as the suspect tried to flee along the tracks, German news agency dpa reported. However, he was quickly detained, police wrote on the social media platform X.
They also declined to give details about how the attack took place.
The governor of Bavaria condemned the attack and called it ‘a terrible day for all of Bavaria.’
‘We mourn the victims of a cowardly and despicable act. We mourn the loss of a small, innocent child who was fatally injured,’ Markus Söder wrote on X.
‘We mourn the loss of a helper who paid for his civil courage with his own life.’
‘The circumstances of this inconceivable act must be fully clarified,’ he added. ‘But now is the time to pause for thought. It simply hurts. We pray for the victims and their families. We hope that all those injured recover quickly and fully.’
Germany’s Interior Minister Nancy Faeser expressed her compassion for the families of the victims and vowed that ‘the investigation will shed light on the background to this terrible act of violence.’
‘My thoughts and heartfelt sympathy are with the parents of the child who was killed, for whom there could be no more terrible news,’ she said. ‘My deepest sympathy also goes to the family of the man who lost his life as a result of this brutal act.’
The suspect is believed to have tried to escape by running across nearby railway tracks, German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reported.
In November, police classified parts of the city centre park as a ‘dangerous place’ due to an increase in ‘drug-related crimes’, which reportedly included robbery and assault.
There were reported to be regular patrols of the area, which is potentially why the suspect was apprehended so quickly.
Police have asked for witnesses to come forward and share any relevant pictures or videos as the investigation into the attack continues.
