Berlin, April 28 (IANS/DPA): German police have arrested a Russian citizen in connection with the deaths of two Ukrainian citizens in the small southern German town of Murnau on Saturday evening.

Two men from Ukraine were stabbed to death on the premises of a shopping centre in Murnau in Upper Bavaria on Saturday evening.

Shortly afterwards, police arrested a man who is considered an urgent suspect. He is a 57-year-old Russian. The police were initially unable to say whether the three men knew each other, and the motive for the crime is still unclear.

"We are still at the very beginning of the investigation," said police spokesman Daniel Katz.

The crime took place at around 5:15 p.m. outside a grocery shop in the small town, the spokesman said. The perpetrator initially fled, but the 57-year-old suspect was quickly apprehended. The officers discovered him at his home address near the scene of the crime.

According to the police, the victims were two Ukrainian nationals, aged 23 and 36, who both lived in the district of Garmisch-Partenkirchen. They died from stab wounds - the older of the two directly at the scene of the crime, the younger a short time later in hospital.

The criminal investigation department is investigating the crime as a suspected double murder. The public prosecutor's office applied for the 57-year-old's arrest and he is to be brought before the investigating judge at the district court on Sunday.