A newlywed couple have claimed their big day was ruined when a man burst inside the church shouting 'Allahu Akbar' and then started tearing down wedding decorations.

Groom Marcel Lohbeck, 35, and bride Friederike were celebrating their wedding with 90 guests in the Karmel Church in Duisburg, a city in western Germany.

Lochbeck said: 'At the beginning of the ceremony, a man with a thick jumper and a hat on came into the church and sat in the back row.

'Shortly afterwards, he stood up and wandered around the candles. He laughed in a disturbing manner and then fondled the statue of Mary.

'He had been speaking in Arabic and partly English. He then started destroying the flowers and kept shouting "Allahu Akbar".'

Two newlyweds have complained that their wedding day was ruined when a man burst inside the Karmel Church in Duisburg shouting 'Allahu Akbar' (file photo)

Police officer Ludger A., 57, the uncle of the groom, reportedly tried to intervene along with the church sexton.

The officer said: 'We tried to calm the obviously traumatised Syrian man.'

After the man again refused to leave the church, there was a fight in which the police officer got slight injuries to his face.

Yet he managed to restrain the man until his colleagues from the Duisburg police could arrive.