One dead as car rams into crowd in Berlin

"A man is believed to have driven into a group of people. It is not yet known whether it was an accident or a deliberate act," police said, adding that he was being held at the scene after Wednesday's incident.

Mass-selling daily Bild said the man had been driving a small Renault car.

Reuters TV showed a large deployment of fire service and ambulances at the scene, with rescue workers carrying empty stretchers, next to the war-ravaged Gedaechtniskirche church, one of Berlin's best-known landmarks.

The incident took place near the scene of a fatal attack on December 19, 2016, when Anis Amri, a failed Tunisian asylum seeker with Islamist links, hijacked a truck, killed the driver and then ploughed it into a crowded western Berlin Christmas market, killing 11 more people and injuring dozens of others.