Germany: One dead, eight injured as car drives into a crowd in Berlin

At least one person was killed and eight injured when a car drove into a group of people in central Berlin on Wednesday (June 8), the fire service said. According to a police spokesman Thilo Cablitz, the driver was detained by the passers-by for some time and was later handed to the police.

As quoted by Reuters, police said: "A man is believed to have driven into a group of people. It is not yet known whether it was an accident or a deliberate act." Meanwhile, authorities are probing the incident.

A police spokeswoman said the driver was detained at the scene after the car ploughed into a shop front along busy shopping street Tauentzienstrasse.

Berlin Police has told Sky News that the driver of the car is a 29-year-old German-Armenian man with dual citizenship.

The incident took place on Rankestrasse near the main shopping district's Breitscheidplatz. It is the scene of the 2016 Christmas market attack in which 11 people were killed.

News agencies reported that a small, silver-coloured Renault car smashed through a plate glass window and lodged inside a shop.

As per AFP, the car with a Berlin licence plate first drove into a crowd at the corner of Tauentzienstrasse and Rankestrasse. It returned to the road and rammed into the shop front on Marburgerstrasse.

Around 130 emergency personnel were deployed to the scene, where several people were seriously injured and some were airlifted by helicopter for treatment.

WATCH WION LIVE HERE