Irishman, 29, rushed to hospital after being stabbed near shopping centre in popular Spain resort as probe launched
The shocking incident happened in the same area of Costa Blanca where an Irish national was left critically injured last month after being shot in the head.
The 29-year-old was rushed to hospital in the early hours of yesterday morning after being attacked near a shopping centre in La Zenia a short drive south of Torrevieja.
He is still at Torrevieja Hospital and his condition has not been made public although his injuries are not thought to be life-threatening.
The alarm was raised around 1.30am on Sunday with reports of a man bleeding in the street.
The victim, said to be known to police, reportedly declined to identify his attacker.
An ongoing investigation into the incident is being led by the Civil Guard.
The same police force revealed late last month it had arrested two men on suspicion of the attempted murder of an Irish national left fighting for his life in a hospital intensive care unit.
The 21-year-old was shot in the head near the same shopping centre called La Zenia Boulevard where Sunday's incident took place.
Detectives revealed on May 27 they had held two male suspects aged 27 and 45 who they later confirmed were also Irish.
The shooting took place on the night of May 13. One of the suspects was held in Orihuela Costa and the other in nearby Pilar de la Horadada.
A Civil Guard spokesman said at the time: 'A court in Orihuela has remanded one of the men, considered to be the shooter, in prison, while the other has been released on bail as a suspected accomplice but banned from leaving the country.'
Detectives have not said what they thought the motive behind the crime was.
Well-placed sources said today they did not believe the two incidents were linked.
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Miten had flown out from the UK within 24 hours with dental records and DNA samples to help with identifying his parents' bodies. 'It was the first thing on my mind: Mum and Dad are coming home,' he said. While he waited for confirmation of their remains, he was given back some of his parents' belongings from the wreckage — his father's shirt and his mother's swan pendant necklace, which his daughter Amira will now inherit. On June 20, three days after arriving, Donaghey was told a DNA 'match' for Fiongal had been found. The next day she met with representatives from the hospital, the British High Commission and an officer from Avon & Somerset police, sent over from the UK as a disaster victim investigator. 'I was told they had found part of Fiongal but not all of him,' Donaghey said. 'I said I wanted to stay until they had finished looking.' By this time Jamie's body had been found. He was returned to the UK in a coffin on June 26. 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'We have spent every day since then on the phone to the Foreign Office, trying to get a response on where Fiongal is,' Donaghey said. 'All the time, I feel like I'm just standing on the edge of a black hole thinking, 'Has he been disposed of?' 'We would like to be able to do the rites necessary for Fiongal in order for us to move on as a family. And that is what is missing. We don't know what poor person is in that casket. This is an appalling thing to have happened. And we would now like the British government to do everything in its power to find out, and bring Fiongal home.' Of the 242 people on Air India Flight 171, 53 were British. Many of them were of Indian heritage and so were buried in India. Only 12 sets of remains were returned to Britain. It is these that would have undergone the second round of DNA testing. The other 10 were all matches. For Miten the most important thing was to make sure that only his mother's remains were buried. 'There may have been a mistake done. But for religious reasons we need to make sure my mother is my mother and not somebody else's remains,' Miten said. 'Knowing 100 per cent that it is mum is very important to us.' A small comfort was that his father's wedding ring was also finally returned. 'It's a miracle to get it back,' said Miten. Questions remain over whether the remains of those who were buried in India without a second round of tests were correct. James Healy-Pratt, an international aviation lawyer and partner with Keystone Law, who is representing 20 of the bereaved families affected by the air disaster, said the families were in contact with Sir Keir Starmer, the prime minister's office and David Lammy, the foreign secretary. Narendra Modi, the prime minister of India, visited Britain last week. Healy-Pratt said: 'Losing a loved one in an air accident is traumatic in itself. These families deserve answers about how this co-mingling of DNA and misidentification of remains occurred. Discussions are ongoing with the UK police and the Foreign Office.' A government spokesperson said: 'We understand that this is an extremely distressing time for the families, and our thoughts remain with them. Formal identification of bodies is a matter for the Indian authorities. We continue to liaise with the government of Gujarat and the government of India on behalf of the Inner West London senior coroner to support the coronial process.'
