Several children aged around three have been stabbed with three young victims fighting for their life after a knifeman launched an ‘abominable’ rampage in a French playground today.
Dramatic video shows the attacker, believed to be a Syrian asylum seeker, being pinned to the ground by armed police officers in a lakeside park in Annecy, an alpine town in southeastern France, at around 9.45am.
Horrified witnesses say mothers ran past them screaming ‘run, run’ in the aftermath of the frenzied attack, which President Emmanuel Macron has condemned as ‘absolute cowardice’.
Witnesses said the knifeman had begun attacking the preschool children while they were playing at a small playground in a scene of utter ‘carnage’. They said he had launched his onslaught on the toddlers because they were ‘easy targets’.
Video taken minutes after the stabbing shows the attacker, a refugee identified as Abdalmash H, 32, carrying a knife while being chased by locals. Parents can be heard in the background screaming for help for their injured children.
Soon afterwards, armed police arrived at the scene and were able to subdue the knifeman before he was arrested.
Four children aged around three and an adult were seriously injured in the attack. Two of the young victims and the adult are now in a life-threatening condition at a nearby hospital.
#Breaking: Update – Video footage reportedly taken minutes after the terror stabbing attack in #Annecy, #France, showing you the Syrian suspect running away after being chased by locals, while people scream for help in the background for the children that had been stabbed. pic.twitter.com/WufuLkgMkf
— Sotiri Dimpinoudis (@sotiridi) June 8, 2023
