The 23-year-old man arrested in the Berlin Christmas-market attack had no involvement in the crime, according to a media report.
As per a report in the German newspaper Die Welt, the arrested suspect in the Berlin incident, a man from Pakistan named Naved B who arrived in Germany a year ago, was not the actual perpetrator of the attack.
"We have the wrong man," Die Welt daily cited a Berlin police official as saying.
"And thus a new situation. The actual perpetrator is still at large and armed, and can inflict more damage."
Police detained the Pakistani asylum-seeker shortly afterward the attack, but he denied involvement, Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said. The man had entered Germany on December 31 last year and arrived in Berlin in February.
Twelve people were killed and nearly 50 others injured when the truck drove into the popular Christmas market filled with tourists and locals outside the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church near Berlin's Zoo station late Monday.
Berlin Christmas-market attack evoked memories of an attack in Nice, France in July when a Tunisian-born man drove a 19-tonne truck along the beach front, mowing down people who had gathered to watch the fireworks on Bastille Day, killing 86 people. That attack was claimed by the Islamic State (ISIS).