those killed in a knife attack in Lisbon, the attacker shot down by the police

First modification: 03/28/2023 – 17:11

The agents were called to the center shortly before 11:00 a.m. local time, where they found a man “armed with a large knife,” according to a police statement.

“Orders were given to the assailant to cease the attack, which he disobeyed, advancing towards the police, knife in hand,” it added.

“Given the serious and continued threat, the police officers used firearms against the person, reaching and neutralizing the aggressor.” Policemen armed with bulletproof vests were stationed in front of the entrance to the Ismaili Muslim center located in a landscaped park in the north of Lisbon.

Prime Minister António Costa said it was “premature to make any interpretation of this criminal act.” “Everything indicates that this is an isolated incident,” he told reporters.

Although police initially said there were “several” injuries, the head of Portugal’s Ismaili community, Rahim Firozali, said one person was injured in addition to the two women who were killed. “The gunman attacked three people who were in the Ismaili center, killing two of them and wounding a third,” he said in a statement. “The motives of the attacker are unknown,” he added.

attacker in hospital

Classes and “other activities that normally take place there” were being held at the time of the attack, Firozali said.

The attacker was taken to the hospital, where he was under police surveillance, according to authorities. “We know that he was an Afghan, a refugee, who for some reason invaded the center,” Nazim Ahmad, head of Lisbon’s Ismaili community, told the private SIC television channel.

The two murdered women were employees of the center, he added. The victims were the attacker’s English teacher at the center and a classmate, according to Portuguese media.

The president of the Afghan Community Association, Omed Taeri, said the attacker had arrived in Portugal “a year or so ago” and was being helped by the Ismaeli center. “This person lost his wife in Greece and is suffering from psychological problems due to this situation,” Taeri told Portugal.

“He was also worried about his employment situation and where to leave his children after he found a job.” Imami Ismaili Shiite Muslims, generally known as Ismailis, belong to the Shiite branch of Islam, according to their website.

Isma’ili Muslims are a “culturally diverse community” of about 15 million people living in more than 25 countries around the world, it says. Prince Karim Aga Khan, the spiritual leader of the world’s Ismailis, inaugurated the Lisbon center in 1998, a year before he obtained Portuguese citizenship.

The building, decorated with hand-painted tiles, has exhibition spaces, classrooms and prayer rooms. In Portugal, a country of about 10 million inhabitants, there are about 7,000 Isma’ili Muslims.

Many fled to Portugal from Mozambique, a former Portuguese colony during the African country’s civil war, which ended in 1992.

Religious violence is rare in Portugal and the country has not suffered a major terrorist attack in decades.

The last major terrorist attack occurred in July 1983, when five Armenian extremists were killed in a suicide attack on the Turkish embassy in Lisbon, which killed two people.

*With AFP; adapted from its original in English