A Syrian who has obtained a residence permit in Sweden carried out a knife attack on New Year’s Eve against two people outside a grocery store in Berlin.

It was at 12 o’clock in the afternoon that German police received a report of a knife attack in the Charlottenburg district. A perpetrator is said to have stolen a knife from a store and then unprovokedly attacked two people.

However, according to German police, this is not a terrorist crime. Jane Berndt, a police spokesperson, said that their assessment is that it involves ‘mental illness’.

Passersby overpowered the perpetrator until the police arrived at the scene. The victims were taken to the hospital after the knife attack, and their condition is still unclear.

The perpetrator is, according to the news agency AP, a Syrian citizen with a residence permit in Sweden. The Syrian is suspected of two attempted murders.