Chancellor Angela Merkel condemned the “poison” of racism on Thursday after a shooter with suspected far-right beliefs killed nine people at a shisha bar and a cafe in the German city of Hanau.
The suspect, identified as 43-year-old German Tobias R., was found dead at his home following an hours-long manhunt.
The body of his 72-year-old mother was also found at the flat in what appeared to be a murder-suicide.
Federal counter-terror prosecutors investigating the case said they saw “a xenophobic motive” behind the shootings, the latest deadly attack blamed on the far right in Germany.
“Racism is a poison, hatred is a poison and this poison exists in our society and it is already to blame for far too many crimes,” Merkel said in Berlin.
The suspect left behind online a “manifesto” and video material that suggested a terror attack motivated by “a hostile attitude to foreigners”, said Peter Beuth, the interior minister of the state of Hesse.
Among the dead were “several victims of Kurdish origin”, the Kon-Med association of Kurds in Germany said in a statement, adding that it was “furious” that authorities weren’t doing more to combat rising extremism.
The rampage started at around 10:00 pm (2100 GMT) on Wednesday at a shisha bar in the Heumarkt area of central Hanau, a city some 20 kilometres (12 miles) east of Frankfurt.