Up to six candidates for Germany's far-right AfD party have died in the last few weeks before local elections in the large western state of North Rhine-Westphalia, the BBC reports.
Police have made it clear that there is no evidence of any criminal activity in these deaths, but this means that new ballots will have to be printed and some postal voters will have to cast their votes again.
North Rhine-Westphalia has a population of 18 million and 20,000 candidates are reported to be running for office in the September 14 local elections.
However, the death toll has raised questions on social media. The country's Interior Ministry has noted that candidates from other parties, including the Greens and Social Democrats, have also died.
The AfD became Germany's second-largest party in February's federal elections, expanding from its eastern stronghold into areas in the west.
The domestic intelligence agency classified it as a right-wing extremist organization in May, before suspending that designation due to a court appeal that is still pending. In three eastern states, its AfD affiliates continue to be listed as extremist.
Initial reports focused on the news that four of its candidates had died, and then the deaths of two candidates also emerged, sparking a wave of conspiracy theories on social media.
AfD co-chair Alice Weidel made no attempt to defuse this speculation, reposting a claim by retired economist Stefan Homburg that the candidates' death toll was "almost statistically impossible."
However, when asked about the rumors in his party, the AfD's second-in-command in North Rhine-Westphalia, Kay Gottschalk, admitted on Tuesday that "what I have in front of me - but this is only partial information - does not support these suspicions at the moment."
He told the podcast Berlin Playbook to Politico that his party wanted the cases investigated "without immediately entering the territory of conspiracy theories."
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