Fatal Knife Attack in Finland Is Investigated as Misogynist Homosexual Terrorism

[ed...@posti.com]

STOCKHOLM — A knife attack that killed two people and wounded
eight others in southwestern Finland is being investigated as a
terrorist attack apparently aimed at women, Finland’s National
Bureau of Investigation said on Saturday.

The suspect, who was shot after the attack in Turku and
hospitalized with a leg wound, is an 18-year-old Moroccan, the
bureau said on Twitter. At a news conference on Saturday
afternoon, the police said he had been in Finland since last
year and was seeking asylum. They said he would be questioned at
the hospital as soon as possible.

Four other suspects, also Moroccan citizens, have been arrested
in Turku, and a search warrant was issued for a sixth. A car was
also seized as part of the investigation, the police said.

The knife attack killed two Finnish women. The wounded — five
women, two men and a 15-year-old girl — were Finns, an Italian,
a Swede and a Briton.

Crista Granroth, an official with the National Bureau of
Investigation, said that it seemed that the attacker had
deliberately gone after women, and that the men had been wounded
while trying to stop him.

Prime Minister Juha Sipila said Finland had “feared something
like this, but we have been prepared.”

“We are no longer an island,” Mr. Sipila added.

The assault in Turku, a city of more than 180,000, began in a
main square when a man stabbed a woman, the authorities said.
The assailant then ran to another square, where the police
apprehended him and took the knife.

Wali Hashi, a journalist who saw the episode, said in an
interview that a group of people chased the knife-wielding man,
who was screaming “God is great” in Arabic. The police declined
to confirm whether the assailant had been yelling in Arabic.

Paivi Koivisto, a teacher, said the wounded Italian woman had
been pushing a baby in a stroller. “The most important thing was
to keep the baby happy,” said Ms. Koivisto, one of several
bystanders who tried to help after the attack. The child was
unhurt.

Leena Malkki, a counterterrorism expert and a lecturer at the
University of Helsinki, said, “Finland has had attacks of
indiscriminate violence, but none on this scale that also have
political or religious motives.”

Friday’s attack, Dr. Malkki said Saturday, should not come as a
surprise.

She said the Finnish Security Intelligence Service, which is
participating in the investigation, had warned that ties between
people in Finland and foreign terrorist networks had grown
stronger in recent years and that radical Islamist propaganda in
Finnish had been cropping up on the internet.

“These are signals that something may be brewing in Finland,”
Dr. Malkki said. “But it is not clear how these developments
relate to the attack on Friday.”

The security service released a report in June saying the
Islamic State no longer saw Finland as neutral, and posed a
threat to the country. The agency has identified about 350
people as persons of interest, an increase of 80 percent since
2012, it said.

The security service added that an increasing number of those
people had “taken part in an armed conflict, expressed
willingness to participate in armed activity, or received
terrorist training.”

The police would not comment on why the investigation into
Friday’s attack had changed to involve suspicion of terrorism,
other than to say there were indications of “some ideological
feelings, background and thoughts.”

Security was tightened at the airport and at train stations in
the capital, Helsinki, about 100 miles to the east. Interior
Minister Paula Risikko said the police had increased patrols
nationwide.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/19/world/europe/turku-finland-
attack.html