May 27, 2006, 14:15 GMT
Berlin - A drunken 16-year-old ran amok and stabbed 28 people in terrifying random attacks in Berlin after a ceremony attended by German Chancellor Angela Merkel to open the city's new train station, police said Saturday.
Six of the wounded were in serious condition but none of the injuries were life-threatening, officials said. Some of the injured had deep stab wounds in the stomach and back and were only saved by emergency operations, police said.
Coming just two weeks before Germany hosts the football World Cup, the attack shocked Berlin and has raised questions over security preparations for June 9 to July 9 extravaganza.
There were no immediate motives for the attack by the youth, who was a German national from Berlin's Neukoelln district - an area with high unemployment and the some of the highest crime rates in the city.
Police said the youth, who was not named, was severely drunk when he carried out the attacks and already had a record for violent crime.
The teen's father was quoted by the Berliner Morgenpost newspaper as saying he had no idea what triggered the stabbing spree.
The attacks began shortly before midnight near the Reichstag parliament building, after a lightshow watched by an estimated 500,000 people that capped Friday's festivities for the opening of Berlin's new Hauptbahnhof, or main train station.
Chancellor Merkel, who had earlier opened the station, had already left the area when the attacks took place.
Police said the youth began stabbing people behind the Reichstag and then ran up a main street in the central Mitte district knifing people in the back at random.
There was panic among the thousands of spectators leaving the train station ceremony and it took over 10 minutes to capture and then overpower the knife-wielding youth after first emergency calls came through.
'All hell broke loose,' said a police spokesman.
Victims were found lying in pools of blood on the street and in doorways over a one-kilometre-long section of the street, officials said.
Berlin's police spokesman, Bernhard Schodrowski, insisted that officers had dealt with the attacks in a professional manner.
'We were at the scene of the crime very quickly, he said.
But in an embarrassing admission, the vice-president of Berlin's police force, Gerd Neubeck, admitted it had been private security guards - not his officers - who apprehended the alleged attacker.
The knife believed to be used in the attacks had been found in the youth's possession, said police. The teen has so far denied being responsible for the attacks, but has been identified by several witnesses.
About 100 police and almost 50 emergency medical-service staff were rushed to area after the stabbings.
Organizers of the World Cup said the attack showed their extensive security preparations had been justified.
'There is no reason to panic,' said the Horst R Schmidt, the vice-president of the German World Cup organisation committee.
Berlin is the venue for the closing World Cup match and a viewing facility for 10,000 people without tickets to the game has been put up with huge TV screens just a few hundred yards from where Friday's stabbings took place.
Police fear that outdoor TV screens, which are being set at about 200 locations across Germany for the World Cup, could be the scene of violence given that there will be limited controls for people watching the games outdoors.
In contrast, those with tickets to watch World Cup matches at stadiums will have to undergo extensive security checks.
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