6 killed in Sydney mall stabbing attack

Witnesses inside the Westfield Bondi Junction shopping mall when the attack took place have described scenes of chaos.

CNN’s Australian affiliate, 9 News Sydney, spoke to an eyewitness who said people were running through the shopping center and falling over each other, describing the situation as “pandemonium.”

Two brothers who were there told 9 News they saw a baby and mother stabbed and tried to help.

One man described seeing a man in a green shirt stabbing others "indiscriminately."

Another man who did not give his name told ABC that the attacker would have continued his deadly rampage if the police officer had not intervened.

One eyewitness who was inside Westfield Bondi Junction shopping mall when the attack unfolded described hiding in the back of a shop.

Crystal Wang explained how, after arriving at Westfield at around 3.20pm – just as the attack began – she walked into a clothes store where "the girls at the shop shut the door behind me and turned off lights."

At first, Crystal thought there had been a power cut, before she realized the severity of the situation she had found herself in.

She added that management announcements probably made the situation worse.

Crystal and other shoppers stayed in hiding for an hour and half, until they were able to leave.

The stabbing attack at Westfield Bondi Junction that has left six people dead has sent shockwaves across Australia, a country where mass casualty events are rare.

The most recent comparable event happened in 2019, when at least four people were killed and one injured in a mass shooting in Darwin, northern Australia.

April 1996 saw a mass shooting which became known as the Port Arthur massacre – the deadliest in Australia’s modern history – when 35 people were killed in the tourist town in the state of Tasmania.

After that incident, gun control laws in Australia were significantly tightened.

Australia's Prime Minister Anthony Albanese described the Sydney mall attack as a "horrific act of violence indiscriminately targeting innocent people going about an ordinary Saturday."

Albanese could not confirm the attacker's motive but commended the officer who confronted the offender and apprehended him. He said, "She is certainly a hero. There is no doubt that she saved lives through her action."

Albanese said that he had no information about the attacker's motive and that speculation would be unhelpful now. 

Australian Federal Police Commissioner Reece Kershaw said that the Australian Federal Police and Australian Security Intelligence Organization were working on the investigation to ascertain the motive of the attacker. 

No information has yet been given as to the attacker's identity or a possible motive.

However, New South Wales Police's Assistant Commissioner Anthony Cooke said they are "not ruling anything out" at this stage, including terrorism.

In a news conference Saturday, Cooke said that he did not know who the offender was, and that the police were making attempts to identify him.

He added that the police are at the very early stages of the investigation. 

A sixth person has been confirmed dead following the attack at the Sydney mall, a New South Wales Police spokesperson told CNN.

Five were killed at the shopping center, and one person has since died from stab wounds in the hospital. 

The attacker was also killed by a police officer at the scene.

A single unit police inspector killed the Sydney mall attacker on level five of the Bondi Junction Westfield shopping center, according to New South Wales Police's Assistant Commissioner Anthony Cooke.

Cooke told reporters that the inspector was nearby and in the local area. She was a senior police inspector who was alone and engaged with the attacker when she was on the scene.

She shot the offender when he raised a knife at her.

“She discharged her firearm, and that person is now deceased,” Cooke said.

The same officer was also seen in videos on social media administering CPR to those who had been injured.

Five people have been killed after a male armed with a knife went on a rampage at a busy shopping center in Sydney on Saturday, in an attack Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has described as "beyond words or understanding."

The suspect acted alone and was shot dead at the scene by an officer, police said.

Scores of other victims remain in a serious or critical condition in hospital, including a baby.