VIENNA, Austria: Austrian authorities on Saturday were investigating the killings of five women in the capital Vienna in a single day, including three found brutally stabbed to death in a brothel.
The bodies of three young women were found with fatal knife wounds in a brothel in Vienna’s underprivileged Brigittenau district on Friday evening after a witness alerted the police.
A 27-year-old man was arrested nearby, still in possession of a knife believed to be the murder weapon, on suspicion of having committed the murders, police said on Saturday.
According to the Austrian news agency APA, no motive has been given for the murders, and the suspect is still being questioned.
In another case, a mother and her 13-year-old daughter were found dead in a Vienna apartment earlier on Friday.
They were believed to have been strangled or suffocated to death, with the father as the prime suspect, APA said.
The Austrian Association of Autonomous Asylums for Women recorded 26 murders of women last year, and the debate about the murders of women and girls, often at the hands of partners or ex-partners, has raged in Austria and across Europe.
The Austrian government has vowed to intervene and has pledged several measures, including increased funding for organizations helping victims of violence.
But NGOs say the government is not doing enough to stop the killings.
Between 2010 and 2020, 319 women were killed in Austria, mostly by their male partners or ex-partners, with a record 43 victims in 2019, according to a government study.
