Hamburg shooting news – live: Police say 8 including gunman killed at Jehovah’s Witness church in Germany

David Semonian, a US-based spokesman for Jehovah’s Witnesses, said in an emailed statement early on Friday that members “worldwide grieve for the victims of this traumatic event”.

“The congregation elders in the local area are providing pastoral care for those affected by the event,” he wrote.

“We understand that the authorities are still investigating the details of this crime. We appreciate the courageous help provided by the police and emergency services.”

Several people were killed and injured Thursday night after shots were fired inside a building where Jehovah’s Witnesses met in the northern German city of Hamburg, officials said.

The international Christian denomination founded in the United States has a more than 100-year history in Germany.

Today, about 170,000 members call the European country home, according to the denomination’s website.

Read more in this report by the Associated Press:

Eight people have been killed and several others wounded in a shooting at a Jehovah’s Witness church centre in Hamburg, Germany.

Police gave the figure on their website.

A possible motive for the shooting has still not been declared.

Police said that the deaths included the gunman who is believed to have acted alone.

Multiple people have died and several others are injured after a shooting in a church in Hamburg.

Lucy Skoulding, Josh Marcus report:

Multiple people were killed at a Jehovah’s Witness church in Germany by a gunman who police believe acted alone.

There are about 170,000 Jehovah’s Witnesses in Germany.

They are part of an international church, founded in the United States in the 19th century and headquartered in Warwick, New York.

It claims a worldwide membership of about 8.7 million.

Members are known for their evangelistic efforts that include knocking on doors and distributing literature in public squares.

The denomination’s distinctive practices include a refusal to bear arms, receive blood transfusions, salute a national flag or participate in secular government.

Additional reporting by Associated Press.

After a shooting at a Jehovah’s Witness church in Hamburg, Germany, police are yet to release an official death toll.

“We only know that several people died here; several people are wounded, they were taken to hospitals,” police spokesperson Holger Vehren was quoted as saying by Associated Press.

He said he had no information on the severity of the injuries suffered by the wounded.

Police did not confirm German media reports, which named no sources, of six or seven dead.

“There were about four periods of shooting,” said student Laura Bauch, who lives near the Jehovah’s Witness church in Germany where multiple people were killed.

“There were always several shots in these periods, roughly at intervals of 20 seconds to a minute,” she was quoted as saying by German news agency DPA.

She said she looked out her window and saw a person running from the ground floor to the second floor of the Jehovah’s Witnesses hall.

Gregor Miesbach, who lives within sight of the building, said to German television news agency NonstopNews that he heard at least 25 shots.

After police arrived, one last shot followed about five minutes later, he said.

Police had no information on the event that was underway in the building when the shooting took place.

While police in Hamburg have declined to say how many people have been killed at a shooting at a Jehovah’s Witness church, they believe that the gunman was among the dead.

In a statement on Twitter, police said they are discontinuing operations at the shooting site.

“According to the current state of affairs, we assume that there is one perpetrator,” police said.

“Police activities in the surrounding area are being successively discontinued. Investigations into the motives behind the crime are continuing.”

German police swarmed a Jehovah’s Witness facility in Hamburg after a shooting left multiple people dead on Thursday evening.

As it happened, officers from a specialised armed unit were already in the area when violence broke out.

“Police officers happened to be near the crime scene because they were on their way back to their accommodation at the police headquarters in Alsterdorf,” Welt reported.

Jehovah’s Witnesses, like a variety of minorities in Germany, were targeted for persecution by the Nazis, as members of the group refused to join the Nazi party or let their children into the Hitler Youth.

“By 1939, an estimated 6,000 Witnesses (including some from Austria and Czechoslovakia) were detained in prisons or camps,” according to the US Holocaust Memorial Museum. “Others fled Germany, continued their religious observance in private, or ceased to observe altogether.”