2023-10-13 19:11:03
A deadly attack on a high school in Arras in the north of the country rocks France. The 20-year-old suspected perpetrator, a former student from Chechnya, broke into the school building on Friday morning armed with two knives. He killed a teacher in the schoolyard. According to press reports, he is said to have murdered him with targeted knife stabs in the throat.
Two other people were seriously injured. According to Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin, the police arrested the man. The man’s brother, who was found near the high school, was also arrested. The high school students were brought to safety in the building.
Macron: Teacher probably saved many lives
During a visit to Arras, French President Emmanuel Macron said that almost three years to the day after the murder of teacher Samuel Paty, “the barbarism of Islamist terrorism has struck again in a school.” The two seriously injured people were still in mortal danger. “The teacher who was killed had tried to confront the attacker and certainly saved many other lives,” Macron said. The break supervisor and other people also tried to prevent something worse from happening. The Lycée Gambetta promotes the German language and teaches some of its students to complete the AbiBac double degree.
The president thanked the police, who arrived four minutes after the emergency call, and the rescue workers. Another operation prevented another attack attempt in another region, Macron said, without giving details. The central public prosecutor’s office for terrorist offenses will shortly provide an overview of the investigation. The president did not specifically mention the situation in Israel and the Palestinian territories, but said the act occurred “in a context that we all know.”
French police officers secure the crime scene in Arras on Friday. : Image: Reuters
The suspected perpetrator was known to the authorities as radicalized and was being observed by the secret service, according to intelligence circles. On Friday evening it was initially not known whether he had commented on the motives for his crime and whether or not there was a connection with the situation in the Middle East or the anniversary of Paty’s murder.
The attacker is said to have attacked his victims shouting “Allahu Akbar”. A video recording of the attack circulated on social networks.
Julian Staib Published/Updated: Recommendations: 53
There was great consternation in France three years after the murder of the teacher Paty in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine near Paris by a young man from Chechnya. The National Assembly temporarily suspended its session. The President of the National Assembly, Yael Braun-Pivet, expressed her solidarity with the relatives of the victim and the injured. “The horror hit a high school,” she said.
The leader of the Republicans (LR), Eric Ciotti, thanked the security forces who caught the attacker. The chairman of the Rassemblement National, Jordan Bardella, expressed “horror”. “Everything must be done to eradicate Islamism,” Bardella said. The far-right presidential candidate Eric Zemmour made a connection with events in the Middle East. “Was it to respond to the Hamas founder’s call?” Zemmour asked.
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