Nantes school stabbing: Teen's manifesto advocated violence, friend reveals

A teenager who attacked students in the French city of Nantes had reportedly been distributing a "manifesto" to the school's pupils just before the attack.

According to French media, around 2,000 students at the school received a strange email from the perpetrator’s account shortly before he carried out the knife attack at noon, Caliber.Az reports.

The email contained a 13-page document in which the teenager expressed his views on globalisation, advocating violent action as a means to oppose it. A friend of the 15-year-old assailant revealed that the teenager frequently discussed topics such as jihadism, Nazism, ecology, and the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States with his peers.

Following the attack, the teenager, who stabbed multiple students at the Notre-Dame-de-Toutes-Aides high school, was placed in a psychiatric clinic. His mental state is reportedly too unstable to allow for police custody at the moment, though authorities have indicated that he may be questioned at a later time.

The attack occurred when the assailant first targeted a senior student, who tragically succumbed to injuries, and then proceeded to another floor of the school, where he began attacking younger students. In total, three high school students were injured. Teachers at the school managed to restrain the attacker until law enforcement arrived at the scene.

The motive for the attack is still under investigation, but authorities have ruled out terrorism as a possible cause at this time.

By Tamilla Hasanova