During an extended hostage crisis in Germany, suspect was captured

The police said that many persons were held hostage in a drugstore in Karlsruhe.

On Friday, German officials started a sizable operation in response to what they described as a hostage crisis in the city of Karlsruhe in the country’s southwest. The German newspaper Stuttgarter Zeitung stated that a suspect held people captive inside a neighbourhood drugstore and demanded a ransom payment of one to ten million euros.

The deployment of law enforcement officials to the area and the closing of numerous neighbouring roadways were verified by the German police. The evening’s festivities at two neighbouring music venues were postponed, and guests who couldn’t go home because of the continuing investigation were told to go to a nearby school, according to the police.

READ ALSO: Shooting at Jehovah’s Witness building in Hamburg, Germany, leaves at least eight people dead

The police merely stated that “several persons” had been held hostage and that they were “unharmed” without specifying the precise number of hostages. At least two hostages were seized, according to the news sources.

According to media sources, the hostages inside the drugstore were held captive for at least four hours. Armoured police cars and heavily armed police personnel can be seen at the site in photos from the incident that were released by the German newspaper Bild.

A special forces squad assaulted the drugstore at around 9:10 p.m. local time, apprehended a male suspect, and then searched the structure, according to the police. No one was hurt during the operation, and all the hostages were released.

The event happened barely one day after a shooter killed seven people at a Jehovah’s Witness centre in Hamburg, Germany. The shooter, who ended up killing himself after being pursued by the police, was later revealed to be a disgruntled former Jehovah’s Witness who had broken ties with the organisation.