0904 — Swedish prosecutors Hans Ihrman confirmed on Saturday that the suspect detained over Friday’s deadly truck attack was a 39-year-old Uzbekistan-born man.
The head of Sweden’s domestic intelligence agency said the man had been on authorities’ radar some time ago.
Anders Thornberg, head of the Swedish Security Service, said “the suspect didn’t appear in our recent files but he earlier has been in our files.”
He said the security services are working with other nations’ security agencies on the matter, but declined to elaborate.
Swedish police chief said the authorities were confident they have detained the man who carried out the deadly truck attack in Stockholm on Friday.
Dan Eliason, head of Sweden’s National Police, told a news conference Saturday that “there is nothing that tells us that we have the wrong person.”
He said police also found an object in the truck that “could be a bomb or an incendiary object, we are still investigating it.”
Sweden’s Prime Minister Stefan Lofven said that Swedes “must get through this. Life must go on.”
After again laying flowers near the site where four people were killed and 15 were injured, Lofven said Monday would be a day of mourning in Sweden, with a minute of silence at noon.
The prime minister also walked around Stockholm, chatting with people having coffee outside a cafe.
Britain’s Prime Minister Theresa May spoke with her Swedish counterpart to offer to work together against extremist attacks.
A Downing Street statement said Saturday she expressed condolences on behalf of the British people in a telephone call to Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven. The statement said the two leaders agreed on the importance of working together to tackle these threats.
Britain was hit by a similar attack last month when a man drove a rented SUV into pedestrians before rushing onto the grounds of Parliament to stab a policeman to death. Four people died, including the attacker.
Sweden’s health service has raised the number of people being treated for injuries from the truck attack to 10. Earlier, Karolinska Hospital had reported nine people still in the hospital.
The health service said four of the 10 were seriously injured, two are in intensive care, and the one child was not seriously injured.
Stockholm’s Karolinska hospital said six of the 15 injured have been released following treatment while eight adults and one child remain in hospital. — AP
