Germany Cinema Shooting: Armed Man Killed After Attacking Movie Theater; More Than 20 Injured

An armed man has allegedly opened fire at a cinema in Germany, leaving over 20 people wounded.

The incident, reported by CNN, occurred Thursday afternoon at approximately 3 p.m. local time after a masked man with a gun and ammunition belt opened fire at local cinema Kinopolis in Viernheim, near the city of Frankfurt.

Between 20 and 50 people have been injured in the attack. It is unclear if any of victims wounded in the attack were shot. Many local media, however, are reporting that the victims have been injured due to the use of CS gas.

Germany public TV reported that the man entered the cinema, fired a shot in the air and barricaded himself inside the cinema complex. The movie theater is part of a large shopping center with over 100 businesses and it's located in Western Germany.

The attacker was confirmed dead just two hours after the shooting took place on Thursday. The Guardian reported: The interior minister of the state of Hesse confirmed at about 5pm that the man had been subdued by police and was dead.

While mass shootings are rare in the European country, CNN recalled two recent shootings that took place in Germany. One was in 2002, when a gunman opened fire at a Erfurt high school and killed 16 people. The other attack happened in 2009, after a gunman dressed in military gear killed 15 people in a rampage.

The motive of the attack is still unclear, but according to CNN, "police have repeatedly warned that Germany could be a target by ISIS." The European country has received more than one million refugees in 2015. Authorities are concerned about the possibility of ISIS cells in the country, reported CNN.

Authorities will not release any more information until the investigation is over.