A French man fatally shot three people in Paris on Friday at a Kurdish cultural center in what authorities said was an attack on foreigners. Protests broke out in the neighborhood after the shooting.
(Bloomberg) — A French man fatally shot three people in Paris on Friday at a Kurdish cultural center in what authorities said was an attack on foreigners. Protests broke out in the neighborhood after the shooting.
The attack took place around noon in the 10th arrondissement at the center and in a hair salon and a restaurant nearby. The 69-year-old suspect was arrested shortly after.
Authorities said that he appeared to have been acting alone and that they didn’t yet know the shooter’s motives. He “clearly wanted to attack foreigners,” but it wasn’t evident whether or not he was specifically targeting Kurds, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said on BFM TV.
Three other people were injured, one of whom remains in critical condition.
French President Emmanuel Macron said in a tweet that Kurds in the country had been the target of an “odious attack.”
The shooter had previously been arrested for two other incidents, including one in which he tried to attack migrants, Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau said. He was released from jail 11 days ago.
Protests Nearby
Protests broke out late Friday afternoon near the site of the shooting. Police fired tear gas to disperse the marchers, who set trash cans on fire, sang pro-Kurdish songs and shouted chants aimed against the Turkish government. Roads in the area were closed off and additional riot police arrived at around 5 p.m.
The shooting comes as Paris prepares to mark the 10-year anniversary of the killing of three Kurdish women activists in the same neighborhood. Members of the cultural center shouted at police that they hadn’t done enough to protect Kurds in France, Le Parisien reported.
France has faced a series of terror attacks since 2015, including a shooting at the offices of satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo that January and the mass shootings at the Bataclan theater and several other sites later that year that left over 100 dead. A truck mowed down dozens of people during Bastille Day celebrations in Nice in 2016.
–With assistance from William Horobin.
(Updates with protests from first paragraph; Macron comment in fifth paragraph.)
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