By Promise Eze
Eight people have been shot dead and three others seriously injured in an attack on a Jehovah’s Witness building in the German city of Hamburg, according to police.
The Guardian reports that the shooting was carried out by a lone gunman who may be among the dead, although this has yet to be officially confirmed.
The first emergency calls were made around 2015 GMT after shots rang out at the building in the city’s northern district of Gross Borstel, a police spokesman at the scene said.
Police tweeted that “several people were seriously injured, some even fatally” in the incident.
“At the moment there is no reliable information on the motive of the crime,” police said, urging people not to speculate.
An alarm for “extreme danger” in the area had been sounded using a catastrophe warning app, but Germany’s Federal Office for Civil Protection lifted it shortly after 3 am local time.
Hamburg police tweeted early Friday: “The police measures in the surrounding area are gradually being discontinued. Investigations into the background of the crime are continuing.”
The port city’s mayor, Peter Tschentscher, expressed shock at the shooting on Twitter.
Sending his sympathies to the victims’ families, he said emergency services were doing their utmost to clarify the situation.
