3 stabbed at London Tube station in ‘terror attack’

Jaswinder Singh Baidwan

Akhran da mureed
Staff member
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A knife attacker slashed a man at an east London metro station, reportedly screaming “this is for Syria”, in what police described as a terrorist incident, prompting the government to urge Britons on Sunday not to be intimidated by the attack.
A pool of blood near the ticket barriers at the Leytonstone Underground station, about 10 km east of central London, could be seen in footage posted on Twitter that also showed the suspect confronting police officers on Saturday evening.
Police said initial reports indicated the machete-wielding man, believed to be aged 29, had also threatened other bystanders. One 56-year-old man suffered serious but not life-threatening injuries. Two other people had minor injuries, police said.
“We are treating this as a terrorist incident,” Richard Walton, who leads the Counter Terrorism Command at London’s Metropolitan Police, said in a statement. The man was arrested after police discharged a Taser which stuns suspects.
An eyewitness quoted by The Guardian and other British newspapers said the attacker appeared to claim that he was retaliating for Western air strikes on Islamist militants in Syria. Police declined to comment on those reports and it was not immediately possible to verify them independently.
British war planes joined the strikes on targets in Syria for the first time on Thursday, a few hours after parliament had approved the involvement.
Senior government minister Iain Duncan Smith said whatever the circumstances, Britons must not let the Leytonstone incident affect their behaviour.
Nevertheless, the attack will draw parallels with the May 2013 murder of British army soldier Lee Rigby, who was hacked to death just south of the Thames River by two Muslim converts.
Britain is on its second-highest alert level of “severe”, meaning a militant attack is considered highly likely, mainly because of the threat posed by Islamic State militants in Syria and Iraq who are encouraging supporters to attack the West.
PM David Cameron won parliamentary approval to bomb the IS in Syria after the group claimed responsibility for Paris attacks.
 
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