Finnish court identifies Turku stabbing suspect

HELSINKI: Court documents on Monday identified the suspect in last week's stabbing spree in a Finnish city, which is being probed as the country's first-ever terror attack, as 18-year-old Abderrahman Mechkah, reports AFP.

Police have previously described the suspect as an asylum seeker from Morocco who deliberately targeted women in the attack at a market square in the southwestern port of Turku on Friday, which left two people dead and eight injured. The motive for the attack was still not known.

The Finnish intelligence agency SUPO said meanwhile that police authorities in southwestern Finland had received a tip early this year that Mechkah "had been radicalised and showed interest in extremist ideologies."

The tip, which had been forwarded to the SUPO, "contained no information about any threat of an attack."

Mechkah, whom police shot in the thigh while arresting him minutes after the rampage, is to appear before the Turku court on Tuesday via video link from hospital, the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) said.

 

Finnish court identifies Turku stabbing suspect

HELSINKI: Court documents on Monday identified the suspect in last weeks stabbing spree in a Finnish city, which is being probed as the countrys first-ever terror attack, as 18-year-old Abderrahman Mechkah, reports AFP. Police have previously described the suspect as an asylum seeker from Morocco who deliberately targeted women in the attack at a market square in the southwestern port of Turku on Friday, which left two people dead and eight injured. The motive for the attack was still not known. The Finnish intelligence agency SUPO said meanwhile that police authorities in southwestern Finland had received a tip early this year that Mechkah had been radicalised and showed interest in extremist ideologies. The tip, which had been forwarded to the SUPO, contained no information about any threat of an attack. Mechkah, whom police shot in the thigh while arresting him minutes after the rampage, is to appear before the Turku court on Tuesday via video link from hospital, the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) said.