Police said the injured 42-year-old officer was in critical but stable condition. (File)
Glasgow:
Scottish police on Friday shot dead the suspect in several stabs at a hotel in Glasgow that housed asylum seekers who injured six people, including an officer.
Scottish police said the incident at the Park Inn hotel in the center of town was not treated as linked to terrorism and urged people to avoid speculating on the motives for the apparent attack.
“Depressingly but predictably, some are using (this) horrific incident to continue their far-right agenda,” Scottish Justice Minister Humza Yousaf said in a tweet.
“Glasgow will not stand your hatred that divides, so don’t even try.”
Police said the injured 42-year-old officer was in critical but stable condition. The other five victims were all men, aged 17, 18, 20, 38 and 53, police said. All were hospitalized.
A man who said he lived on the third floor of the hotel said on Sky News television that he heard a man screaming for help and a woman screaming.
He went to investigate and discovered that the elevator was “covered in blood”, then saw two people “out of breath” after being stabbed.
“Dumped” in hotels
The UK Home Office used empty hotels across the country to house asylum seekers and refugees during the coronavirus pandemic.
The Park Inn hotel was used to house asylum seekers during the epidemic, the non-profit and human rights organization Positive Action in Housing tweeted.
The Kurdish Scottish Association reportedly said, according to the Glasgow Times newspaper, that there were around 100 asylum seekers in the hotel at the time.
Residents complained of being kept indoors and lack of money, while some had mental health issues, the report said.
Positive Action in Housing has already raised concerns about the fact that single men, women, families and pregnant women – many of whom are vulnerable – are “thrown” into hotels.
“During the current COVID-19 pandemic, the hotel was occupied for temporary accommodation,” said Radisson Hotel Group spokesperson Tom Flanagan Karttunnen.
Scottish Prime Minister Nicola Sturgeon thanked the emergency services for ensuring that “a very, very serious incident did not get worse”.
Interior Minister Priti Patel called it “deeply alarming” and Prime Minister Boris Johnson tweeted that he was “deeply saddened by the terrible incident”.
It happened less than a week after three people were stabbed to death in a park in Reading, in the south-east of England, that police were dealing with terrorism.
A 25-year-old man, reportedly a Libyan asylum seeker, was arrested after being stabbed to death by three friends.
“Blood all over the walls”
After the stabbing, television footage showed the police pulling people out of the hotel with their hands over their heads.
An anonymous asylum seeker from the hotel told The Times that he was woken up by screams in the middle of the afternoon.
“I called the elevator but when the door opened, it was covered in blood all over the walls. I took the stairs and went down,” he said.
“When I got out, I saw one of the male receptionists. He was covered in blood. He was stabbed in the abdomen.”
The man said he saw the police assisting another bloody receptionist at the entrance to the hotel.
“When I got out, people were screaming and saying that the man was still inside the hotel.”
Another witness, who named Louisa, told Sky News that she saw “people being treated with blood on the ground”.
“I saw people running out of the hotel with the police shouting,” raise your hands, raise your hands, get out, “she said.
“The police were yelling at people from other buildings near the Park Inn to stay inside and not to enter the street.”
(With the exception of the title, this story was not edited by GalacticGaming staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
