Police officers in the western German city of Krefeld shot and wounded a man in a cinema foyer on Thursday night.

The incident occurred after the man reportedly set three fires in the Cracau district of the city, police said.

What we know so far

The suspect is a 38-year-old Iranian citizen who lived in the city, a statement from the police in Essen said on Friday. 

Police said the exact motive was still unclear and was the subject of current investigations, with no initial evidence of a terror attack.

Shortly after the man's arrest, police said there was no further danger to the population, with the man believed to have been acting alone. No one was injured in the three fires.

Officers were first alerted at 7:50 p.m. local time after an incendiary device was thrown into the local employment office, about 700 meters away from the cinema.

A white minibus belonging to a local drug outreach charity nearby had two smashed windows and was blackened with soot.

The fires are believed to have been set at roughly the same time.

Police cordoned off a wide area around the cinema, at the city's main station. Police had also sealed off a nearby building in which a top-floor flat was reported to have been on fire.

According to German broadcaster WDR, the man had wanted to enter the cinema with a Molotov cocktail and another weapon.

mf,dh/lo (dpa, AFP)