Daily US Times: Three people stabbed to death at a church in the southern city of Nice, in what France President Emmanuel Macron said was an “Islamist terrorist attack.”
Mr Macron said France would not surrender its core values after visiting the Notre-Dame basilica. An extra 4,000 troops are being deployed to protect schools and churches.
Officials said one elderly victim was stabbed “virtually beheaded”, while another woman and a man also died.
A male suspect was shot and detained.
Prosecutors have opened an investigation into the attack and the country has raised its national security alert to its highest level.
The suspect is Brahim Aioussaoi, a 21-year-old Tunisian who arrived by boat on the Italian island of Lampedusa in September, according to police.
He was placed in Covid-19 quarantine there before being released and told to leave Italy. Earlier this month, he arrived in France.
Christian Estrosi, the mayor of Nice, spoke of “Islamo-fascism” and said the suspect had “repeated endlessly ‘Allahu Akbar’ (God is greatest)”.
On Thursday, two other attacks took place, one in France and one in Saudi Arabia.
A man was shot dead in Montfavet near Avignon, a southern French city, after threatening police with a handgun.
A guard was attacked outside the French consulate Saudi Arabia’s Jeddah. The guard taken to hospital and a suspect was arrested.
Speaking after visiting the place where the attack took place, President Macron said: “If we are attacked once again it is for the values which are ours: freedom, for the possibility on our soil to believe freely and not to give in to any spirit of terror.”
“I say it with great clarity once again today: we won’t surrender anything,” the French President added.
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