French stabbing suspect charged with attempted murder

The man accused of injuring four young children and two adults in a stabbing attack at a park in south-eastern France was handed preliminary charges of attempted murder on Saturday.

The 31-year-old has so far remained silent about his motive while in police custody and before the examining magistrate, public prosecutor Line Bonnet-Mathis said in Annecy.

There were still no indications of a terrorist motive for the Thursday morning stabbing spree on a playground in the French Alpine town of Annecy.

The victims are no longer in life-threatening condition, the prosecutor said.

The injured children, who are from France, Britain and the Netherlands, are between 22 months and 3 years old.

The suspect, who was remanded into custody, had been psychiatrically examined and deemed mentally sound. He is a Syrian who had lived in Sweden for several years.

The man was recently informed that his asylum application in France had been rejected because he had already been granted asylum in Sweden, Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin said this week.