Paris Knife Attack on Saturday Night

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A knife attack by a delusional 20-year-old in the 11th arrondissement of Paris on Saturday left one dead and four injured as well as the death of the murderer

Police officers arrived quickly on the scene of a knife attack by a crazed loner and shot him dead, but not before he murdered one person and injured four others in the centre of Paris on Saturday night. The murderer was wanted by the authorities and in a follow-up operation, three friends of the killer were arrested.

Daech (aka Islamic State) was quick to claim responsibility for the random attack in a video published the following day. The attack took place at 20:40 on Saturday night in the Quatre-Septembre quarter near the Paris Opera. Witnesses are reported to have heard the assailant cry “Allah Akbar”. A nearby police patrol of three policemen in the area were quickly informed. When they arrived on the scene, the killer threatened them, shouting “Shoot me! Shoot me! I’ll cut you!” One policeman deployed his taser pistol but without success. A second policeman then opened fire with live rounds, hitting the assailant twice. He was declared dead at 21:24.

The following day, the statement from Daech declared that the attack was “a revenge attack against the coalition states” – the international military force that recently carried out bombings in Syria and Iraq and of which France was a member.

Also on Sunday, the parents of the killer were placed under arrest. They live in rented rooms in a flat on Rue Pajol in the 18th arrondissement of the city. In Strasbourg, meanwhile, a friend of the murderer was arrested while police searched his house. According to police sources, this is part of an ongoing investigation to determine whether the terrorist was working alone or with the aid of accomplices.

The deceased terrorist was named by police as 20-year-old Khamzat Azimov. He was born in Chechnya in 1997 and grew up in Strasbourg. He became a naturalised French citizen in 2010 at the same time as his mother.

Although he had a clean record, he has been on police wanted lists since the summer of 2016. According to a source close to the investigation, he was questioned a year ago by the anti-terrorist section of the brigade criminelle because of his association with a man who was connected to an individual who had departed for Syria.

The murder victim is believed to have been a 29-year-old man originally from Le Mans, who was living in the Gobelins quarter of Paris (in the 13th arrondissement) and whose first name was Ronan. He was the 246th murder victim of terrorist attacks on French soil since 2015. The injured victims were: a Chinese tourist who was stabbed in the back at a bar on Rue Marsollier and who was brought to hospital in a “critical condition”; a 54-year-old woman who was found on Rue Gaillon in a critical condition with injuries to the face and hands; a 26-year old woman and a 31-year-old man, both of whom are said to be in a serious condition. There were also a number of people treated for shock and all the injured parties are said to be now out of danger.

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