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Roundup: Swedish police confirm identity of Stockholm truck attack suspect

Xinhua, April 9, 2017 Adjust font size:

Swedish Police confirmed the identity of the suspected truck attacker as a 39-year-old man from Uzbekistan, who is currently under police custody.

In the press conference on Sunday, Jonas Hysing, chief of national police operations, said, the Uzbek man suspected of ramming a truck into a crowd in Stockholm, killing four people and wounding 15 others, had expressed sympathy for Islamic State and was wanted for failing to comply with a deportation order.

Swedish Security Service confirmed to Swedish news agency TT Sunday that the 39-year-old terror suspect had sought asylum in Sweden.

According to the Swedish TT news agency on Sunday, the suspect applied for a residence permit in Sweden in 2014. In June 2016, Swedish Migration Board rejected his application and in December he was given a deadline of four weeks to leave the country.

However, in February 2017, the police was unable to enforce deportation order as the man was not at the address he registered.

Currently, there are three men suspected of the involvement in the Friday attack under police arrest, of whom two were taken on Friday and the other on Sunday. Police believe the Uzbek man is the one who drove the truck for the attack.

A homemade bomb placed in a bag was found in the truck, which was suspected to have failed to be detonated during the attack, Swedish Television (SVT) reported Saturday, quoting sources.

Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven on Sunday vowed to enforce the country's deportations effectively in wake of the Stockholm truck attack, after being informed of that the major attack suspect had been denied of residence application and failed to be deported.

Lofven said this made him frustrated and that one must be deported if being rejected of application for a residence permit or an application for asylum.

"We need to improve the effect," Lofven told TT, adding that "it is also important for confidence in the system."

Swedish police confirmed on Sunday that two Swedes, one Briton and one Belgian, were killed in the Stockholm truck attack. Of the four victims, three were killed at Drottningatan in central Stockholm, and one died in the hospital later.

A truck rammed into people on a central Stockholm street before crashing into a department store on Friday, killing four and wounding 15 others. Nine wounded people are still hospitalized. Enditem