The vehicle approached from behind, accelerated and drove into the crowd at around 50 kilometers per hour at the end of the gathering, according to Bayerischer Rundfunk (BR). As a result, the police fired shots and arrested the driver.
It is suspected to be an attack, states Markus Söder, who leads the state government in Bavaria, at a hastily convened press conference on site according to Bild.
Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz says that the suspected man should not expect Germany to turn a blind eye if he is found guilty of a deliberate crime.
He must be punished, and he must leave the country, says Scholz according to Tagesschau.
The suspected driver is reportedly a 24-year-old man who is an asylum seeker from Afghanistan. The man is known to the police previously due to, among other things, drug-related crimes.
Several of the injured are small children.
For several of those hit, the condition is serious, for some life-threatening, says Bernhard Peschke, spokesperson for the fire department, to AFP.
"Deeply shocked"
Images show a demolished car and a large police and rescue operation in central Munich. The demonstration that the man drove into is related to an ongoing strike in Munich, organized by the trade union Verdi, which, among other things, organizes public employees. According to BR, the injured are demonstrators.
Security in the German city has been tightened due to an international security conference that begins there on Friday and will continue over the weekend. On Thursday, among others, US Vice President JD Vance and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyj are expected to arrive.
Whether or how Thursday's act will affect the conference is still unclear, the organizers announce, stating that they are in close contact with the police.
Several attacks
In recent times, Germany has been hit by a series of high-profile violent crimes and terrorist attacks with perpetrators from Afghanistan, which has become a major theme ahead of the election later in February.
On Thursday, the trial began against another Afghan man in his 25-year-old who is charged with killing a police officer and seriously injuring several others when he went on a rampage with a knife at a market in Mannheim last year.
And three weeks ago, a mentally ill man, also from Afghanistan and of the same age, attacked a group of preschool children in Aschaffenburg. A two-year-old boy and another person were stabbed to death.
On Thursday, a 21-year-old German man was also arrested, suspected of planning a bomb attack against a refugee center in Brandenburg.
