Police Say Several People Injured In Attack On German Train

A knife and ax attack on a train in Germany has left several people seriously injured.

The attacker was a 17-year-old Afghan, NPR's Soraya Sarhaddi-Nelson reports, citing Joachim Herrmann, interior minister of Bavaria, who was interviewed on the German public broadcaster ARD.

Herrmann says the attacker fled the train and was fatally shot by special forces troops who happened to be in the area and were able to quickly deploy to the site.

There was "no clear reason" for the attack, Herrmann says.

The attacker "stabbed his fellow passengers on a regional train near the Southern German town of Würzburg," Esme Nicholson reports from Berlin.

"About 20 people were said to have been in the rail carriage at the time of the attack," she says.