Police line in Germany
Police line in GermanyiStock

Three people were wounded in a knife attack on a high-speed train in southern Germany on Saturday, AFP reported.

Local police said a 27-year-old man was in custody, with unconfirmed media reports claiming the suspect was of Syrian origin and suffered from psychiatric issues.

The motive for the attack on the passenger train, which was making its way from Bavaria to the northern city of Hamburg with roughly 300 people on board, was not yet clear.

Local prosecutors are handling the case rather than the federal officials who would deal with suspected terrorism, according to AFP.

The three victims were being treated in hospital, said police in Neumarkt in der Oberpfalz, adding that none had suffered life-threatening injuries.

While the motive is still being investigated, Germany has been on a high level of alert due to a series of terrorist attacks in the country in recent years.

In one attack, a 17-year-old Afghani with an axe attacked passengers on a train in Wurzburg before being shot dead by security forces.

In a second incident, an attacker set off a bomb in a restaurant in Ansbach, killing himself and wounding 12 others.

The worst such attack took place in December of 2016, when Tunisian terrorist Anis Amri killed 12 people and injured dozens more when he drove a truck into a Christmas market in Berlin.

Last October, a 20-year-old Syrian man was arrested in connection with a knife attack that killed one tourist and seriously injured another in Dresden.