A Syrian migrant set off an explosive device near an open-air music festival in southern Germany that killed himself and wounded a dozen others, authorities said Monday, the third attack to hit the region in a week.

The 27-year-old had spent time in a psychiatric facility, but the authorities said an Islamist motive for the attack on Sunday night in the city of Ansbach appeared “likely”.

Germany is reeling after nine people died in a shopping centre shooting rampage in Munich on Friday and four people were wounded in an axe attack on a train in Wuerzburg on July 18.

All three attacks were in Bavaria, which has been a gateway for tens of thousands of refugees under German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s liberal asylum policy.

Police said the man intended to target the music festival on Sunday but was turned away because he did not have a ticket, and set off the explosive device outside a nearby cafe.

The perpetrator was killed in the blast, police said in a statement, and a spokeswoman said 12 people were wounded, three of them seriously.

“My personal view is that it is very likely that this was a real Islamist suicide attack,” regional interior minister Joachim Herrmann said.

Herrmann added that beyond the heightened security fears, he was worried “the right to asylum would be undermined” by the events of the past week.

Sunday’s explosion happened just outside a cafe in Ansbach city centre, not far from where more than 2,500 people had gathered for the concert, at around 10pm.

Credit: Punch