PARIS, Oct 31 (Reuters) – Paris police shot and critically wounded a girl carrying a hijab who was behaving in a threatening method and shouted “Allahu Akbar” and “You’re all going to die” in a metro station on Tuesday morning, Paris police chief Laurent Nunez stated.
France is on its highest state of alert after the Oct. 13 homicide of a schoolteacher in a suspected Islamist assault, which officers have linked to what they referred to as a “Jihadist atmosphere” linked to the Israel-Gaza struggle.
The fully-veiled lady was shot on the Bibliotheque François-Mitterrand station. Commuters had reported her “uttering aggressive, Jihadist comments,” authorities spokesman Olivier Veran stated earlier.
When police arrived, “they pulled the woman aside and first asked her to calm down but also to show her hands to show they presented no particular danger,” he added.
“What happened then was that law enforcement officers had no option but to open fire on this woman given the danger of the situation.”
The fireplace service, which offered emergency look after the girl, stated she was shot in the stomach. She was transferred to a close-by hospital the place she was getting therapy, police chief Nunez stated, including that her life was in hazard.
Nunez stated the girl’s id was but to be confirmed however that she may very well be the identical one who in 2021 threatened city patrols of the counter-terrorism Sentinelle operation and had been put in a psychiatric ward over psychological well being points.
“This person refused to comply with summons and police fired their weapons,” Nunez stated, including the scenario had been “extremely threatening.” The lady had threatened to blow herself up, French media together with Le Parisien quoted the prosecutor’s workplace as saying.
The lady turned out not be in possession of explosives on the time she was shot, Nunez stated.
The metro station, on the RER C line, was evacuated after the incident, police stated.
Two investigations have been opened, one towards the girl and a second into the usage of weapons by police.
Reporting by Tassilo Hummel, Dominique Vidalon, Michel Rose, Sudip Kar-Gupta; Editing by Ingrid Melander, John Stonestreet, Ed Osmond and Tomasz Janowski
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