One dead, several injured in terror stabbing at market

A knifeman who was on a terror watchlist has gone on a horrific stabbing spree at a packed market in France.

One person has been killed and three police officers injured in a horror knife attack in France.

A 37-year-old Algerian man, who is on a terror prevention watchlist, was arrested at the scene in the eastern city of Mulhouse, near the German border.

A civilian passer-by who intervened was fatally wounded, police said in a statement. According to Mulhouse prosecutors, he was a 69-year-old Portuguese national.

A French forensic police officer takes pictures as he works on the site of the knife attack. Picture: AFP

Firefighter and police vehicles near the site of a knife attack in Mulhouse, eastern France. Picture: AFP

France’s national anti-terror prosecutors unit (PNAT), which has taken charge of the investigation, said the suspect first attacked the municipal police officers, shouting “Allahu Akbar” (God is greatest).

“Horror has just gripped our city,” mayor Michele Lutz said on Facebook.

France’s President Emmanuel Macron addresses the press after having being informed of the knife attack in Mulhouse. Picture: AFP

French President Emmanuel Macron told BFMTV it was “beyond doubt” it was an “Islamist terrorist act”.

The government was determined to continue doing “everything to eradicate terrorism on our soil”, Mr Macron added.

Mr Macron, who spoke during a visit to France’s agriculture fair, said the “solidarity of the nation” was with the attack victim and his family.

The suspect was born in Algeria and has been under judicial supervision and house arrest, with an expulsion order from France.

Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau told French broadcaster TF1 that France had tried to expel him 10 times, with the Algerians refusing each time to accept him.

“Once again, it is Islamist terrorism that has struck,” he said. And, once again, he added, problems of migration were “at the origin of this terrorist act”.

Prime Minister Francois Bayrou said that “fanaticism has struck again, and we are in mourning”.

Originally published as One dead, several injured in terror stabbing at market