“There are several dead,” a police spokeswoman said, adding that several of those injured were in critical condition. A police spokesman said around 30 people were injured.
A security source added: “The scenario is such that an attack cannot be ruled out.”
Mass-selling daily Bild reported in its online edition that three people had died in the incident. It showed pictures of where police had cordoned off an area of the city.
The van drove into people sitting at tables outside the Grosser Kiepenkerl restaurant, which is popular with tourists, the police spokeswoman said.
Mass-selling daily Bild reported in its online edition that three people had died in the incident.
Police said they were not looking for further suspects after the driver took his own life after the crash, but on Twitter they urged people to avoid Muenster city center.
“The danger is over,” the police spokeswoman said.
The incident came one year to the day after a truck attack in Stockholm that killed five people, and also evoked memories of a December 2016 truck attack in Berlin that killed 12 people.
Anis Amri, a failed Tunisian asylum seeker with Islamist links, hijacked a truck on Dec. 19, 2016, killed the driver and then ploughed it into a crowded marketplace, killing 11 more people and injuring dozens of others.
