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Agence France-Presse

A stabbing that left a teenager dead and five other people injured in southern Austria was an “Islamist attack”, the interior minister said on Sunday, with a 23-year-old Syrian asylum seeker held.
Saturday’s attack in the city of Villach has shaken the Alpine nation, where far-right-led talks to form a government collapsed this week with security one of the major issues.
Austria had so far only seen one jihadist attack, in 2020, when a convicted Islamic State (Isis) sympathiser went on a shooting rampage in downtown Vienna, killing four.
In Villach’s “Islamist attack with IS connections”, the Syrian asylum seeker held was radicalised online “in a short space of time”, according to Interior Minister Gerhard Karner.


During a raid of the suspect’s flat, police said they found “clear evidence of Islamist radical thought”, such as Isis flags on the wall.
No weapons or “other dangerous items” were found, police said, adding the suspect was under investigation for “murder and attempted murder” charges.
In the attack in the centre of the city in Carinthia state, the suspect went after passers-by with a folding knife.
A fellow Syrian food deliverer, also an asylum seeker, intervened by ramming a car into the attacker, who was slightly injured and then arrested.
A 14-year-old Austrian died and five other people were injured, three of them seriously. Among the wounded are two other teenagers, both aged 15.
The suspect is an asylum seeker with a valid residence permit and no criminal record, according to police.

At the scene of the crime on a shopping street, residents were placing candles. Some hugged.
Local resident Tanja Planinschek told Agence France-Presse she was “afraid for my children”, adding Austria “should open our eyes and see whom we let in, whom we help, whom we leave with all kinds of freedoms. If nothing is done, it will get even worse”.
Authorities praised those who helped, including the food deliverer who stopped the attack.
The deliverer, Alaaeddin Alhalabi, 42, told the Krone tabloid that he “didn’t think twice” when seeing the attack.
“He wanted to go towards the city centre, there were children on the street – I couldn’t let that happen,” he said.
The Villach attack came just two days after a suspected Afghan asylum seeker rammed a car into people in the city of Munich in neighbouring Germany, killing a two-year-old girl and her mother and wounding dozens more.

German police said the 24-year-old Afghan may have had Islamist extremist motives for the attack.
Austria’s Karner said he wanted to have random “mass screenings … of special target groups, namely asylum seekers … with a Syrian or Afghan background” to try to prevent such attacks.
But he did not give further details on how this could take place.
Austrian President Alexander Van der Bellen called the attack “appalling”, while conservative Alexander Schallenberg, who currently holds the chancellorship, said “hate, intolerance and extremism have no place in our open pluralistic society”.
Austria’s Muslim representative council, IGGOe, also condemned the “heinous act” that stood “in complete contradiction to the values of our faith”.
Far-right leader Herbert Kickl – whose party topped September’s national elections for the first time – has called for “a rigorous clamp-down on asylum”.
Kickl’s Freedom Party (FPOe) this week failed in talks to form a government with the election runner-up and incumbent conservatives because of disagreements – among others – over who would hold sensitive cabinet posts dealing with security.
Austria hosts a large Syrian refugee population of almost 100,000.
After Bashar al-Assad was ousted from power in Syria in December, Austria and several European countries froze pending asylum requests from Syrians to reassess the situation.
In addition, Austria’s interior ministry said it was preparing “an orderly repatriation and deportation programme to Syria”.


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Austria

Austria calls stabbing that killed teen an ‘Islamist attack’

People mourn at a makeshift memorial of candles and flowers in Villach, Austria. Photo: APA via AFP

People mourn at the site of the stabbing. Photo: AP

Saturday’s rampage came after an attack on Thursday in Munich in neighbouring Germany by an Afghan national who drove his car into a crowd. Photo: Reuters

Sweden jails man for joining Islamic state, in first under new law

The Swedish parliament in 2023 adopted new legislation banning participation in a terrorist group. Photo: AFP

Sweden had been adopting tougher anti-terror laws since 2017, after Uzbek asylum seeker Akhmat Akilov – who had sworn allegiance to IS – drove a truck down a busy shopping street in Stockholm that year, killing five people. Photo: AP

Car bomb kills 20 in northern Syria, deadliest attack since Assad toppled

Syrian White Helmet civil defence workers inspect the site of a car bomb attack on the outskirts of Manbij, Syria on Monday. Photo: Syrian Civil Defence White Helmets via AP

Suspect in Munich car ramming had ‘Islamist orientation’: police

A car is lifted onto a tow truck at the scene in Munich. Photo: dpa

Members of German union Ver.di pay their respects on Friday at the scene where a car drove into a crowd in the southern German city of Munich on February 13. Photo: AFP

(From right) Bavarian Minister President Markus Soeder, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, and Munich’s Lord Mayor Dieter Reiter take part in a silent commemoration at the attack site. Photo: dpa

A memorial at Schoental Park for the victims of Aschaffenburg’s fatal knife attack in January. Photo: dpa

Sweden mourns victims of deadliest shooting, but gunman’s motive remains unknown

 People light candles at a makeshift vigil near Campus Risbergska in Orebro, Sweden, on Wednesday. Photo: AFP

Nursing student Hellen Werme, who hid under a bed during the deadly shooting attack, reacts during an interview in Orebro, Sweden, on Wednesday. Photo: Reuters

Police officers stand guard outside Campus Risbergska in Orebro, Sweden, on Wednesday. Photo: AFP

Asylum-seeker drives car into Munich crowd, injures 28

Police work at a car that drove into a crowd in Munich. Police have detained the driver and did not consider him to pose any further threat, but declined to comment on whether it was an accident. Photo: Reuters

Security has been in sharp focus in Germany ahead of a federal election next week and following a string of violent attacks. Photo: AFP

A police sniffer dog works at the car that drove into a crowd in Munich. Photo: Reuters

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One killed, five injured in attack by a 23-year-old Syrian asylum seeker in the Austrian city of Villach


One killed, five injured in attack by a 23-year-old Syrian asylum seeker in the Austrian city of Villach.
