Vienna Police said in a series of tweets that two unidentified assailants entered the church with at least one of the suspects demanding money and valuables from the monks. A large-scale manhunt was launched following the incident as major police forces were deployed to the scene as the area around the church was cordoned off. The robbery lasted for hours, they reported, adding that police have also found “tied and [in some instances] heavily injured” monks only three hours later. Police wrote on Twitter that, while the precise motive remains unclear, “a possible terror motive can be ruled out” in the incident at the Maria Immaculata church..

Officers were searching for the perpetrators, including in the complex where the incident took place.
Five Christian monks are tied up and then left injured, one of them seriously, after a robbery at a church in Vienna, Austria.