A man carrying a butcher’s knife and shouting ‘Allahu Akbar’ killed two female passengers before being shot dead by soldiers at Marseille’s train station in southern France.
According to Daily Mail, the attack at Marseille’s busiest train station took place early this afternoon, as scores of armed police officers and soldiers swarmed the area.
Both victims were women, with one left with a ‘sliced neck’. The other was stabbed in the stomach.
Local official Oliver de Mazieres told AFP: ‘Two victims have been stabbed to death.’
The prosecutor for the area Xavier Tarabeux said the knife man was shot by soldiers, while Marseille police urged people in the city to avoid the area around Saint-Charles station.
The prosecutor’s office in Paris said in a statement the probe would focus on ‘killings linked to a terrorist organisation’ and the ‘attempted killing of a public official’, two terror-related charges.
Early pictures from the scene showed a woman lying on the ground and armed police standing over the attacker on the floor. A white sheet was later placed over the assailant.
In a tweet, President Emmanuel Macron said: ‘Deeply outraged by this barbaric act, in pain with the families and relatives of the victims of Marseille.
‘I salute the military and the police officers who responded with cold blood and efficiency.’
A police source said: [‘The stabbings were] frenzied and took place in front of lots of witnesses. The man first shouted threats, and then launched into the two women.
‘The two were killed by a knife, and then solider on anti-terrorism duties intervened. They shot the man dead’ said the source.
He added that the suspect shouted Allahu Akbar – Arab for ‘God is the Greatest’ – during the attack. He was estimated to be aged between 25 to 30 years and no had no identification papers on him.
