A lawmaker with Angela Merkel’s party has died after crashing into a plane during a flight home.
Karin Strenz, 53, was traveling with her husband from Cuba, said Eckhardt Rehberg, a co-legislator with their center-right Christian Democratic Union party, according to the news agency dpa.
The plane made an emergency landing in Ireland, but rescuers could not save Strenz, Rehberg said Sunday. It was unclear what the cause of death was or why she visited Cuba.
The German parliament, the Bundestag, said on Monday that she had not traveled on official parliamentary matters.
Prosecutors in the city of Schwerin said they had launched an investigation to determine the cause of death, which was used in such cases, and would ask Ireland for help. They said they expected an autopsy to take place in Ireland.
Strenz has been a member of the German parliament since 2009 and represents a constituency in the northeastern state of Mecklenburg-West Pomerania.
She did not intend to run for re-election in Germany on 26 September. Early last year, Strenz and another lawmaker were attacked in raids by prosecutors investigating alleged money transfers from Azerbaijan.