Paris: One dead and two injured after man attacks tourists near Eiffel Tower
A man has died and another two people have been injured after being attacked in Paris on Saturday evening.
The deceased is a German national who was among tourists targeted around the Quai de Grenelle, located about 15 minutes from the Eiffel Tower in the French capital.
The attack took place at around 7pm GMT when a man attacked a couple with a knife, mortally wounding the German national, French interior minister Gerald Darmanin said.
The man was then chased by police and attacked two other people with a hammer before being tasered and arrested.
Mr Darmanin said the attacker had shouted “Allahu Akbar” (God is great) and told police he was upset because “so many Muslims are dying in Afghanistan and in Palestine”.
He praised the police and said “there would doubtless have been others dead” if they had not responded quickly.
Mr Darmanin said a 25-year-old suspect was in custody.
He did not identify the man but said he was a French national who had left prison after four years in 2020 and was under surveillance, as well as undergoing psychiatric treatment.
The anti-terrorism prosecutor’s office has confirmed it has opened an investigation.
Details about the victims are not immediately known.
The attack comes less than eight months before Paris hosts the Olympic Games and could raise questions about security at the global sporting event.
France has been under a heightened terror alert since the fatal stabbing in October of a teacher in the northern city of Arras by a former student originally from the Ingushetia region in Russia’s Caucasus Mountains.
“We will cede nothing in the face of terrorism. Never,” France’s Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne said on X, formerly Twitter, following Saturday’s attack.