Manhunt after woman killed, several injured at Swiss rave shooting; police say terror motive possible

A 22-year-old woman has been killed and five people injured, one seriously, in a shooting overnight at a rave in the Swiss town of Aarau, which local police say could have been an act of terrorism.

Local police say all victims are residents of Switzerland and in their 20s. Italy’s foreign ministry says Swiss authorities informed them that an Italian woman had died, and Italy offered its support with the investigation.

Swiss President Guy Parmelin offers condolences to the family of the victim. “In these difficult hours, my full sympathy goes to all people affected by this tragic event,” he says on social media.

A manhunt is underway, and large areas of the town have been cordoned off, police say, appealing to the public for any images of the incident.

But police admit that they are at the early stages of the investigation, and that they do not yet know how many attackers there were, nor their motives.

“The end is not in sight,” Aargau’s Police Commander Michael Leupold tells reporters.

“Where an active shooter is firing into a crowd of thousands of people at an event, it’s perfectly clear that we consider terrorism as a motive,” he says, adding that investigators are also considering a non-terrorist mass shooting or an unknown criminal motive for the attack.

“We are treating all three possibilities as equally likely.”