Three men in their twenties were stabbed to death in little over 12 hours as London’s toll of street killings approached the highest number in a decade.

The second of the fatal attacks happened outside Harrods in Knightsbridge shortly after midnight.

Paramedics fought for 40 minutes to save the victim’s life before he was pronounced dead at the scene.

A pedestrianised stretch was sealed off behind police tape this morning, with a white police tent erected in Hans Crescent, next to the department store’s side doors.

Two hours later and seven miles east in Deptford, a man died from stab wounds on a housing estate opposite a nature reserve in Bronze Street.

The latest round of bloodshed began at 2pm yesterday when Exauce Ngimbi, 22, was hacked to death by a machete-wielding gang near his mother’s home in Hackney.

Detectives were today quizzing a 14-year-old boy and two 26-year-old men on suspicion of his murder. Witnesses described how paramedics battled to save Mr Ngimbi after the attack.

His mother Théthé Ngimbi, 51, was joined by relatives in a vigil at the scene in Clarence Mews last night. She sobbed: “I want to see him, he was a good boy. It’s not fair.

Mr Ngimbi’s cousin Calvin Bungisa, 22, was stabbed to death in April after being ambushed and chased by masked thugs in Kentish Town.

His mother told the Standard her son, who was known to police, had turned his life around.

Mrs Ngimbi said: “The last thing he did before he went out was to say a prayer. He was scared he would become a victim of the violence on the streets. He was a devout Christian and a good son. No young person should be in such fear.

“He had planned to start a business with his sister, he was looking forward to the future. He was my only son and today I have to go and see his dead body. It’s too much for a mother to take.”

She added that Mr Ngimbi, an Arsenal fan who doted on his two younger sisters, rarely went out and promised to be home by 11pm. “Enough is enough. Our family is hurting so much. We do not feel safe and more action is needed to keep our kids safe,” she said.

A man who had been at work when the violence erupted said: “It was about five or six guys fighting in the street, they had machetes and then one of the boys was stabbed multiple times and there was lots of blood.

“He was just on the floor and his friends didn’t know what to do.”

The killings bring the number of homicide investigations launched in London this year to 129 — five fewer than 2018’s decade-high total of 134.

Anyone with information on any of the killings is asked to contact police on 101 or Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111.