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Police in Finland classify fatal stabbings as act of terrorism

By Daniel Uria
Ambulance cars gather at the site of a multiple stabbing on the Market Square in Turku, Finland on Friday. Police in Finland classified the stabbing as an act of terror. 
 Photo by Ari Matti Russka/EPA
Ambulance cars gather at the site of a multiple stabbing on the Market Square in Turku, Finland on Friday. Police in Finland classified the stabbing as an act of terror. Photo by Ari Matti Russka/EPA

Aug. 19 (UPI) -- Police in Finland have classified stabbings that left two people dead and at least six injured as an act of terror.

The Friday stabbings, suspected to be conducted by an 18-year-old Moroccan citizen, in the city of Turku were deemed a terrorist act after Finland's National Bureau of Investigation began investigating the attack along with Finnish intelligence services.

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"The incidents were initially investigated as murders, but in the light of further information received during the night, the offenses include now murders with terrorist intent and their attempts," police said.

Police shot the suspected assailant in the leg and arrested him after he conducted a stabbing rampage at two marketplaces near each other in the city center.

Two Finnish citizens were killed in the stabbings and two Swedes and one Italian were among those injured.

Security was tightened throughout the country after the stabbing and National Police Commissioner Seppo Kolehmainen warned armed security personnel may be seen in the streets.

Mayor of Turku, Aleksi Randell, said the city center is safe following the attack and urged citizens to stay calm.

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"I want to say this to all our residents: It is difficult to understand that such violence would happen on this scale in Turku," he said. "Occurrences that have been all too frequent in Europe and around the world have now arrived here, which is what [we've] been afraid of."

Hours after the attack in Finland, a 31-year-old man was killed and a 25-year-old man was seriously wounded in a stabbing attack at a store in Dusseldorf, Germany.

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