The newly elected mayor of a town in western Germany was found with serious stabbing wounds on Tuesday, and Chancellor Friedrich Merz said she was the victim of “an abhorrent act.”

Iris Stalzer was elected as mayor of Herdecke on Sept. 28. She is a member of the center-left Social Democrats, the junior party in Germany’s conservative-led national government.

German news agency dpa, citing unidentified security sources, reported that she was found with life-threatening injuries and had several stabbing wounds.

Police said only that there was a large operation underway in Herdecke.

Merz wrote on social media that “we fear for the life of mayor-elect Iris Stalzer and hope for her full recovery.”

The leader of the Social Democrats’ parliamentary group in Berlin, Matthias Miersch, told reporters that “we heard a few minutes ago that newly elected mayor Iris Stalzer was stabbed in Herdecke.” He said that “we hope that she survives this terrible act.”

“We can’t say anything at the moment about the background,” he added.

Stalzer, who beat a candidate from Merz’s center-right Christian Democrats in a runoff vote to win election, is due to take office on Nov. 1. Herdecke is a town of about 23,000 people in western Germany’s Ruhr region, between the cities of Hagen and Dortmund.

Stalzer’s website says she is 57 and married with two teenage children. It says she has spent almost her whole life in Herdecke and has worked as a lawyer specializing in labor law

—AP