Germany news: Leipzig ramming suspect ordered to psych ward

Germany's Chancellor Friedrich Merz marks one year in office as his coalition faces infighting, falling poll numbers and rising AfD support, putting pressure on his pledge to revive the economy and the political center.

For more on his first year in office, watch this video:

A judge has ordered the driver accused of carrying out a deadly car ramming in Leipzig on Monday be placed in a psychiatric hospital.

The judge found "compelling reasons" to believe the suspect, a 33-year-old German male, had been "in a state of at least significantly diminished responsibility" at the time of the incident.

The judge also said it was likely "that the defendant, due to his condition, will commit further serious unlawful acts of comparable gravity" — prompting the hospitalization order for the sake of public safety. 

Authorities said they believe the incident was a deliberate car ramming and that the suspect "wanted to kill and seriously injure as many people as possible."

But they also said they do not believe he had any religious or political motives.

It was also revealed on Tuesday that the suspect had already received mental health treatment in the weeks leading up to Monday's incident.

Prosecutors said he had been admitted to a specialist psychiatric hospital from April 17 to 29 "due to his mental condition and with his consent."

Regional health officials told the AFP news agency that the man did not present a danger to himself or to others during this time and was thus allowed to leave the clinic.

The suspect is being investigated on suspicion of double murder and multiple counts of attempted murder.

A year after taking office, Germany's federal leadership is struggling with the drudgery of coalition governance.

Whenever there are problems, the coalition partners are blamed. Or US President Donald Trump.

Click here to read DW's analysis of the crisis brewing inside Germany's governing coalition.

The CDU/CSU bloc, which leads Germany's governing coalition, has reelected Jens Spahn as its parliamentary group leader.

Spahn ran unopposed and received 86.5% of the vote from CDU/CSU lawmakers.

This is slightly less than when he was initially elected to the position a year ago with 91.3% of the vote.

Spahn will now be tasked with maintaining the coalition between the conservative CDU/CSU and the Social Democrats as tensions build over policy compromises. He said both sides had been caught up in "spirals of self-affirmation and justification" in recent months.

"We have a duty to solve these problems from the political center, within this coalition," he said.

Click here to read DW's analysis of what the futer holds for the CDU firebrand and former health minister.

Public satisfaction with the German coalition government has dropped to just 11%, according to a new survey.

A Forsa poll, commissioned by broadcasters RTL and NTV, came one day before Chancellor Friedrich Merz marks his first anniversary in office. It found 87% of respondents were dissatisfied. The coalition had enjoyed 38% approval in July 2025.

The government has been rated poorly across key policy areas, including infrastructure, efforts to curb price increases, social security reform and the broader economic situation. About 80% to 90% of respondents said they were dissatisfied in these areas.

Views on limiting illegal migration were somewhat less negative, with 32% expressing satisfaction and 60% dissatisfaction.

Forsa surveyed 1,002 eligible voters between April 30 and May 4. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

Germany's top diplomat has underscored the importance of a strong African continent for its foreign and security policy.

"Successful Africa policy is indispensable for German and European foreign and security policy," Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said at an Africa Day event at the Foreign Ministry in Berlin. "Germany will continue to advocate for African interests on the international stage."

Wadephul said Germany firmly backed Africa's efforts to unite and navigate current geopolitical turbulence. He said Berlin has long supported the African Union and maintains individual partnerships with all 54 African states.

Germany has also called for stronger African representation in global institutions. Wadephul said the current system within the United Nations no longer reflects geopolitical realities and backed reforms, including permanent and non-permanent seats for African countries on the Security Council. He also supported full G20 membership for the African Union.

German is currently seeking a non-permanent seat on the Security Council.

He noted that around 70% of Security Council issues relate to Africa and said demographic trends would further increase the continent's global weight.

Germany's Deutsche Post is set to drop its long-standing corporate name and rebrand as DHL, in a move marking a shift toward international logistics that has since come to dominate its business.

Shareholders approved the change at the company's annual general meeting, with the new name expected to be entered into the commercial register in the second half of the year.

Deutsche Post, a successor to Germany's former state postal service, the Deutsche Bundespost, was gradually privatized in the 1990s. It bought the US logistics firm DHL in 2002, after which its international business became increasingly important. The acronym DHL stands for its founders Adrian Dalsey, Larry Hillblom and Robert Lynn.

Today, only about one-fifth of revenue comes from its traditional German mail and parcel operations. Most income is generated by global divisions, including express delivery, freight transport and supply chain logistics — all operating under the DHL brand.

"Over the past decades, our company has developed from the former Deutsche Bundespost into a globally leading logistics group," said CEO Tobias Meyer.

Deutsche Post had already publicly rebranded itself as DHL Group two years ago, dropping Deutsche Post from its marketing name. The latest move makes it official, with the new name expected to be entered into the commercial register in the second half of the year.

Meyer's predecessor, Frank Appel, had delayed a legal name change to avoid unsettling German staff. The rebranding in 2024 only affected the company's external image, leaving its legal structure unchanged.

The name Deutsche Post AG won't disappear entirely, though. Instead, it will simply be used for a new subsidiary handling the company's German mail and parcel business, instead of the entire group.

Audi has reported declining profits, marking a fourth consecutive first-quarter drop.

The carmaker, a unit of Volkswagen said it earned €559 million ($653 million) after tax, down more than 11% from a year earlier.

The automaker has been facing mounting pressure across the industry, with US tariffs weighing on results. Finance chief Jürgen Rittersberger said the levies caused a hit in the low hundreds of millions of euros. He added that without the tariffs, Audi would have posted pre-tax profit growth.

China has remained another key weakness. Earnings from the market dropped sharply to €28 million, down from €170 million a year earlier, as competition intensified and incentives for electric vehicles were scaled back. A model change for the A6 also weighed on performance, although improvement is expected later in the year.

Revenue has also declined, falling to €14.2 billion from €15.4 billion. The figures cover the wider Audi Group, which includes Bentley and Lamborghini.

The Mainz-based company BioNTech that shot to global notoriety amid the COVID-19 pandemic for its work on one of the first mRNA coronavirus vaccines has announced drastic restructuring plans. 

The company is winding down its COVID vaccine production entirely, leaving the production to US partner Pfizer going forward.

"In the course of this year we will produce the last doses here in Germany," a company spokeswoman told the Reuters news agency. 

Amid the restructuring, the company is closing production centers in Idar-Oberstein, in Marburg, in Singapore in Asia, and another German facility in Tübingen belonging to the CureVac rival company that BioNTech fully took over as of late 2025 after a lengthy acquisition process.

The company said that the closures should be completed by the end of 2027, and that it would look into possibilities to sell the affected facilities. 

BioNTech said last year that it would be cutting between 950 and 1,350 full time jobs over the subsequent two years — it's not clear how many it had already cut. The company says that up to 1,860 jobs could be affected in total amid the expanded restructuring. 

BioNTech said that it was reacting to a marked decline in demand for COVID vaccines. For a brief period at the height of the pandemic, these were recommended to almost anybody for regular renewal but they now tend to be administered mainly to the elderly and other high-risk people.

The company logged falling revenues of €118.1 million (roughly $138 million) in the first quarter of this year, compared to €182.8 in the same period in 2025. Its net losses for 2025 exceeded €531 million, attributed to high research and development costs in its restructuring process. BioNTech's founders announced in March that they were stepping down to start a new venture. 

In Germany, BioNTech plans to keep its main base in Mainz, as well as office facilities only in Berlin and Munich. The company has retooled to return its focus primarily to research, on treating cancer and other illnesses.

A couple accused of stealing millions from parking meters in Bavaria has fully confessed at the start of their trial.

The 40-year-old male defendant told the court at the Kempten Regional Court he deeply regretted his actions and said the charges were entirely accurate.

Prosecutors allege the former city employee, with help from his 39-year-old wife, stole around €1.9 million ($2.2 million) over a decade. The pair, in custody since November, face charges of commercial theft, which carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison.

The man had been responsible for emptying parking meters. The couple is accused of depositing the coins into private accounts and converting them into supermarket vouchers. Between 2020 and 2025 alone, they are said to have stolen €1.34 million in 335 separate cases.

More than 500 additional cases dating back to 2015 are now time-barred and cannot be prosecuted. However, authorities are seeking to confiscate nearly €584,000 linked to those alleged offenses as well, bringing the total amount prosecutors aim to recover to about €1.9 million.
 

German Transport Minister Patrick Schnieder has defended Germany's fuel tax cut and signaled it could be extended.

He told RND the so-called reduction was the right decision, adding some sectors and drivers depended on cars and trucks and needed support.

Fuel taxes were cut by about 17 cents per liter starting May 1, costing the state billions in lost revenue. The measure is set to run for two months, though Schnieder said a decision on any extension would depend on how the situation develops.

Environmental groups like Greenpeace want the cut to be reversed as "quickly as possible," saying it is likely to line the pockets of oil companies and benefit commuters with "gas-guzzling cars."

Many experts have criticized the policy, warning it could boost fuel demand. Economists have suggested a general highway speed limit to curb consumption.

However, Schieder rejected that idea, saying it was not for the state to dictate everything.

"Anyone who still hasn't grasped that driving at 180 or 200 km/h on the motorway empties their tank much faster, and thus empties their wallet much faster, than at 120 or 130 km/h, is beyond help," he told the RND. "The state doesn't have to be everyone's nanny and tell everyone what's good and right. Therefore, I consider a speed limit unnecessary."

German companies have been feeling the impact of the Iran war, especially in their Middle East operations, a survey has shown.

The downturn is most pronounced among firms active in the Gulf region, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Israel, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, where assessments of current business conditions have sharply deteriorated. Sentiment has also worsened in countries such as India and Sri Lanka due to their dependence on energy imports from the region, the Association of German Chambers of Industry and Commerce (DIHK) said.

The DIHK's head of foreign trade, Volker Treier, said hopes for an economic recovery had been dashed, adding the global economy is in "crisis mode" and companies are experiencing this directly. "This is more than just a slowdown in the economy. Uncertainty ​is becoming the determining factor," Trier said.

The DIHK survey, based on responses from more than 4,500 internationally active companies, found only 21% expect economic conditions to improve at their foreign locations over the next 12 months, while 32% anticipate a decline.

High energy costs are now seen as the biggest risk by 46% of firms, more than double the level in autumn 2025. Supply chain disruptions (40%) and rising raw material prices (37%) are also major concerns.

A suspect in a deadly car ramming in Leipzig is set to appear before a judge, as prosecutors move swiftly to formalize charges.

Authorities said the 33-year-old German man surrendered without resistance after the attack and is expected to be brought before a magistrate, who will decide on pre-trial detention.

Two people — a 63-year-old woman and a 77-year-old man — were killed, and at least three others seriously injured when the driver plowed through a central pedestrian area. Officials have described the incident as a deliberate rampage but say there is no indication of a political or religious motive.

The suspect was previously known to police but not for relevant offenses, according to reports. He was detained inside the vehicle shortly after the incident.

Prosecutors are likely to pursue charges including murder and attempted murder, as investigators continue to examine the suspect’s background and mental state.

Leipzig's chief public prosecutor Claudia Laube reaffirmed that authorities assume a rampage. There are no indications of "another interpretation" and no signs of additional perpetrators.

Saxony state premier Michael Kretschmer expressed deep shock and said his thoughts were with the victims and their families. "Such an act leaves us speechless — and it makes us determined. We will do everything to clarify it quickly and fully. The rule of law will act with full consequence," Kretschmer said.

Guten Tag from the DW newsroom in Bonn.

You join us in the aftermath of a deadly car ramming in the eastern city of Leipzig that left two people dead and at least three seriously injured.

The suspect is set to face a judge later on Tuesday. Prosecutors say he appeared to have acted alone and apparently had no political motive. 

Stick with us to find out more about this and more of the news coming out of Germany today.