A man has been arrested after three people were stabbed at a busy railway station in Paris. Reports suggested the alleged attacker was first tackled by passengers at the Gare de Lyon just after 7.30am on Saturday, before officers arrived at the scene. Police said early indications suggested the suspect was suffering from a psychological disorder and the attack was not terrorism-related. The three victims, who were in the station’s lower level hall 3 and were all taken to hospital, were said to have been injured when they tried to stop the alleged attacker. Two of them sustained non-life-threatening injuries. A third victim, a man, was stabbed in the abdomen and was reported to be in a critical condition on Saturday evening. Police said a fourth person was treated for shock at the scene. The arrested man, 32, was originally from Mali and had shown police an Italian driving licence during his arrest. He was reported to have been living legally in Italy since 2016, had arrived in France on Thursday last week and was not known to police in France or Italy. The Paris chief of police, Laurent Nuñez, said he had allegedly attacked people at random with a knife and a hammer. “The weapons are being analysed,” he said. He added there was nothing to suggest it was a terrorist act and the suspect “clearly suffers from psychiatric problems” judging by the medication he told officers he was taking and that was found on him along with an appointment card for a consultation at a Turin psychiatric hospital. Nuñez said detectives were examining the man’s telephone to establish his recent contacts and movements in order to rule out terrorist links. Investigators said the man had tried to set fire to his backpack on an escalator before the attack. The paper quoted a police source saying he appeared to have “psychological difficulties”. The interior minister, Gérald Darmanin, wrote on X: “This morning at the Gare de Lyon an individual injured three people with a knife before being arrested. One person is seriously injured; two others suffered less serious injuries. They were treated by the emergency services. Thank you to those who restrained the perpetrator of this unacceptable act.” The public prosecutor’s office said: “Initial indications, which have yet to be confirmed, suggest that the accused first set fire to his rucksack, before grabbing a knife and hammer and attempting to strike a passer-by who managed to avoid them.” A psychological evaluation of the suspect would be carried out either Saturday afternoon or Sunday morning, it added. There have been several knife attacks in the French capital in the past year. In December a 26-year-old French man stabbed a German tourist to death near the Eiffel Tower. Darmanin said at the time there had been a “failure” in the suspect’s psychiatric treatment. In January last year, six people were injured in a knife attack at the Gare du Nord in Paris. The attacker was shot three times by police. The Gare de Lyon is one of six mainline railway stations in Paris. It serves national trains to the south-east of France and international links to Switzerland, Italy and Spain. It is also a hub for suburban train services and the Paris Metro. Hall 3 serves the RER suburban rail services and was closed after the attack until Saturday afternoon.