Two women killed in stabbing at high school in Sweden

Police officers attend the scene at a school in Malmo
AP
Sami Quadri22 March 2022

An 18-year-old student has been arrested after two women died following a stabbing at a high school in Sweden.

Police rushed to Malmo Latin School in the centre of Malmo at 4.15pm on Monday after receiving reports that a male was wielding a knife and an axe on-site.

Local media said the alleged attacker called the emergency number to give up his location and admit that he had killed two people.

He was arrested shortly after the arrival of the first police patrol.

The two victims, both women in their 50s, were employees at the school.

Both “were taken to the hospital but their lives could not be saved”, authorities said.

AP

Around 50 people were believed to be on school premises at the time.

Social media footage shows heavily armed police inspecting the building.

The school remained cordoned off with police tape several hours later, and numerous police cars and ambulances were still at the scene.

After extensively inspecting the scene and interviewing witnesses, the authorities are convinced the suspect acted alone.

No motive has been established.

"A lot of work remains ahead of us to understand what happened and the motivation behind this appalling act," said Asa Nilsson, one of the heads of the investigation.

In January, a 16-year-old boy was arrested after wounding a student and a teacher in the town of Kristianstad, also in southern Sweden,

The case had been linked to a similar attack in August in the town of Eslov, around 50 kilometres (30 miles) away, when a student attacked a 45-year-old school worker.

In October 2015, three people were killed in a racially-motivated attack at a school in the western town of Trollhattan by an assailant later killed by police.

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