What we know: German town mayor stabbed

A newly elected German town mayor was badly wounded in a stabbing attack on Tuesday that Chancellor Friedrich Merz condemned as a "heinous act".
Here is what we know.

- Noontime attack -

Iris Stalzer, 57, mayor-elect of the town of Herdecke near the western city of Dortmund, was found at her home at around 12:40 pm (1040 GMT) with life-threatening injuries, said police.

"She was immediately treated in intensive care and taken to a hospital by helicopter," police said in a statement, adding that a homicide investigation was launched.

"Investigations are underway in all directions, and a family connection cannot currently be ruled out."

"We fear for her life," Merz wrote on X soon after reports of the stabbing emerged, demanding that the crime and its background "be swiftly clarified".

News outlet Der Spiegel said that Stalzer suffered more than 10 stab wounds, citing unnamed investigators.

- Domestic dispute? -

According to Bild daily, Stalzer was found with stab wounds to her stomach and back in her home, where her adoptive children, a 15-year-old boy and a 17-year-old girl, were both present.

The boy told police that his mother had been attacked by several men on the street, Bild reported.

The daily added that police took the teenager away for questioning in handcuffs.

Der Spiegel wrote that there had been a previous case of domestic violence in the Stalzer household in the summer of this year.

The politician's daughter had used a knife against the 57-year-old, the report said.

Prosecutors and police said in a statement later that there was "no sign that this was a politically motivated deed... On the contrary, we suspect it was a family dispute."

They added that the politician's children were at a police station as investigators "try to clarify the circumstances" of the attack.

- Political response -

Stalzer, of the centre-left Social Democratic Party (SPD), had been elected mayor of the town in the industrial Ruhr area on September 28.

The town administration on Tuesday voiced its "shock and dismay" at the attack.

In Berlin, the SPD's parliamentary group leader, Matthias Miersch, told reporters: "Our thoughts are with her and we hope she survives this terrible crime... We cannot comment on the background at this time, but we are more than deeply saddened." 

AFP