4 killed in attack at police HQ
PARIS:A 45-year-old IT assistant at the police headquarters in central Paris went on a knife rampage inside the building on Thursday, killing three police officers and an administrative worker before he was shot dead by an officer, French officials said.
The officials declined to say what the motive was for the attack, which took place at lunchtime, and they said they were still trying to understand if there was a terrorism link.
But sources close to the police were quoted by French media as saying that the attacker had a grievance with his managers.
Jean-Marc Bailleul, a police union leader, described the incident as criminal rather than an act of terror. “It was a moment of madness” Bailleul told BFM TV.
The area around the police headquarters, which is close to Notre-Dame Cathedral, was sealed off and a metro station was shut for security reasons as the attack unfolded.
The dead, three men and a woman, included three police officials and a police administrative assistant, according to Paris prosecutor Remy Heitz. Another person was wounded as is undergoing surgery.
Heitz said police were searching the attacker’s home, and that anti-terrorist investigators were evaluating what had happened, for any terrorist links.
Speaking outside the police headquarters, French Interior Minister Christophe Castaner said the attacker was known to his colleagues and had worked for some time in the IT department. “He had never presented any behavioural issues,” Castaner said.