Morning commuters at Winterthur’s main train station were thrust into panic when a man armed with a knife began attacking passers-by, wounding three people in what a senior regional official described as a “terrorist act”.
“I am exceptionally calling this a terrorist attack,” Mario Fehr, who oversees security in the Swiss canton of Zurich, told reporters. He said it was “clear from the scene that the motive for this act must be sought in the realm of radicalisation and extremism.”
Witnesses recounted confusion and fear as the suspect—identified by police as a 31-year-old Swiss national—suddenly started stabbing people during the morning rush hour at the station in Winterthur, Switzerland’s sixth largest city.
“Shortly after 8.30am (7.30am Irish time) a man injured three people with a bladed weapon” at the station, Zurich cantonal police said in a statement.
Police said the alleged attacker was arrested at the scene and that his “motive is under investigation”.
Video aired by several Swiss media outlets and shared on social media showed a man with long dark hair and a full beard running in front of the station and shouting “Allahu akbar!” (God is the greatest), while raising his right hand.
Police said the victims were Swiss citizens aged 28, 43 and 52. All three were taken to hospital.
Speaking to SRF public broadcaster, police spokesman Roger Bonetti said one of the injured had been seriously wounded.
A taxi driver, 65-year-old Turhan Muslu, told the Blick newspaper he saw the attack unfold.
“I saw him rush off the ramp and try to stab a man,” Muslu said, adding that the intended victim had “fought back fiercely” before station security staff intervened and restrained the attacker.
“It all happened so fast. If those security guards hadn’t (arrived) so quickly, I don’t know what would have happened.”
In footage published from a distance and recorded on a mobile phone, the suspect—wearing a black T-shirt and shorts—can be seen running past a group of young children, apparently on a school trip, without stopping.
“I heard a man scream ‘Allahu akbar’ five or six times, in a very agitated manner,” a young man who said he witnessed the aftermath told Blick, which did not name him.
He said the children and other onlookers had “run across the road” in panic.
“Thinking back on it, I still have goosebumps,” he said.
Random attacks on passers-by are uncommon in Switzerland, and residents in Winterthur—about 25kms northeast of Zurich—expressed shock at what had happened.
“This is not OK. We want peace,” taxi driver Basharat Iqbal, who arrived at the station after the incident, told AFP.
“I was shocked.”
Zurich cantonal police said they were working alongside Winterthur municipal police, Swiss Federal Railways’ transport police, and hospital, ambulance and rescue teams as part of the operation.
Images carried by local media showed multiple police cordons set up at several points inside and outside the station.
Despite the violence, Swiss Federal Railways said train traffic was not disrupted.
