A knife-wielding man in New Zealand super market attacked and stabbed multiple people savagely. The attacker managed to stab-injure at least 6 people before he was shot by the police.
The lone-wolf stabbing attack took place at a supermarket in the New Zealand city of Auckland. According to the police, the extremist entered an Auckland supermarket on Friday and started stabbing multiple people.
The New Zealand police shot the attacker dead within 60 seconds of the attack. Authorities are calling the incident in an “ISIS-inspired” terrorist attack.
According to the details, the stabber was a Sri Lankan National who was already on red-list of authorities. The suspect whose identity cannot be revealed due to court suppression orders, had arrived in New Zealand in October 2011.
He became a person of security interest in 2016 due to concerns about his ideology and had been under constant surveillance of security agencies. However, prior to Friday attack, he had not committed any offences that would lead to arrest or detention.
When the Sri Lankan suspect entered New Lynn supermarket on Friday, surveillance Police assumed he had gone to do some shopping. But instead, he picked up a knife from a display and started “running around like a lunatic” and stabbing people.
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern called the stabbing incident a “terrorist attack” and said the culprit had been inspired by the ISIL (ISIS) group.
“A violent extremist undertook a terrorist attack on innocent New Zealanders. It was hateful, it was wrong. It was carried out by an individual, not a faith. He alone carries the responsibility for these acts,” Ardern said during a media briefing.
Posthumous videos of the incident have been leaked online. Panicked shoppers can be seen running out of the supermarket before the sound of gun 6 shots are heard.
“People were running out, hysterically, just screaming, yelling, scared. I also saw an elderly man lying on the ground with a stab wound,” an eye witness told a New Zealand news agency.
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