(MENAFN- Khaleej Times)

UK police said Sunday two British nationals were arrested on suspicion of attempted murder following a mass stabbing on a train in eastern England, adding the attack was not a "terrorist incident".

The men in custody were a "a 32-year-old male, a Black British national, and a 35-year-old man, a British national of Caribbean descent," British Transport Police superintendent John Loveless told reporters.

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"At this stage, there is nothing to suggest that this is a terrorist incident."

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Armed police were at the scene after being alerted around 7.40 pm (1940 GMT) just after the train had left the town of Peterborough.

Late Saturday, police were inspecting the train, which was being treated as a crime scene. People were also led away outside the station in space blankets, an AFP photographer saw.

The East of England Ambulance Service said on X that it had mobilised a "large-scale response" to Huntingdon station including ambulances, air ambulances and tactical commanders.

Train operator London North Eastern Railway (LNER) said railway lines were closed while emergency services dealt with the incident.

LNER, which runs trains along the east of England and Scotland, urged passengers not to travel, warning of "major disruption" with the lines blocked in the area.

The mayor of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, Paul Bristow, said on X that he was aware of "horrendous scenes", adding that his "thoughts and prayers (are) with everyone affected".

Knife crime

Knife crime in England and Wales has been steadily rising since 2011, according to official government data.

While Britain has some of the strictest gun controls in the world, rampant knife crime has been branded a "national crisis" by UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

His Labour government has tried to rein in their use.

Nearly 60,000 blades have been either "seized or surrendered" in England and Wales as part of government efforts to halve knife crime within a decade, the interior ministry said Wednesday.

Carrying a knife in public can be punishable by up to four years in prison, and the government said knife murders had dropped by 18 per cent in the last year.

Two people were killed - one as a result of misdirected police gunfire - and others wounded in a stabbing spree at a synagogue in Manchester at the start of October in an attack which shook the local Jewish community and the country.

And a man appeared in a London court on Thursday charged with murder after a stabbing attack in broad daylight which left one dead and two injured.

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