Three dead in shooting in central Paris

An armed attack in the center of Paris, France, alarmed the authorities and left three citizens dead and three others injured.

The shooting occurred before noon this Friday and would have been caused by a 69-year-old man who was also arrested.

According to the AFP agency, the attack occurred near a Kurdish cultural center where there are also several shops. The reasons for the attack have not yet been given, although the elderly man already registered two murder attempts committed in 2016 and 2021.

Present at the scene, the mayor of the X district of the capital, Alexandra Cordebard, told the press that the alleged attacker was injured and was taken to hospital.

French Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne called the shooting an “appalling” act and expressed her full support for the victims.

Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin, who was on a trip to northern France, reported on Twitter that he was returning to Paris “due to the tragic shooting that occurred this morning.”

The shots shortly before noon caused panic among residents of the neighborhood, a bustling area with numerous shops, restaurants and bars.

Selma Akkaya, a Kurdish journalist and activist who witnessed the attack, told the AFP that “there are six people injured” and that, among them, is “a famous Kurdish singer”. The shooter pointed, according to her, “towards a hairdresser’s.”

“We saw an old, white man walk in and shoot at the Kurdish cultural center and then he went to the barbershop next door. We are sheltering in the restaurant with the workers,” Romain, deputy manager of the Pouliche Paris restaurant, located on the same street, said by phone.

According to another witness, a resident of the neighborhood who was passing by at the time of the attack, “there were people in a panic, yelling at the policemen, pointing towards the hairdresser’s: ‘he’s there, he’s there! come in!'”.

According to what he said, he saw two people on the floor of the hairdresser’s with injuries to their legs. (YO)