Radicalized Muslim shot dead at Paris airport after attacking soldier
Man already known to police, intelligence services • Poll shows centrist Macron, who wants to renew military conscription, leading presidential campaign
PARIS (Reuters) – Security forces shot dead a man who tried to seize a soldier’s gun at Paris Orly airport on Saturday, forcing the evacuation of the busy airport and putting security back in the spotlight in the middle of France’s presidential election campaign.
The man, identified as a 39-year-old radicalized Muslim who was already on the radar of police and intelligence services, had earlier shot and wounded a police officer with an air gun after a routine traffic stop north of Paris, officials said.
With the country in the throes of a highly-charged election campaign after two years of attacks on civilians and public targets by Islamic State terrorists – several of them in Paris – the anti-terrorism prosecutor opened an investigation.
A police source identified the man only as Zied B. and said he was known to the police for theft and drug offenses.
An army spokesman said he was shot dead after a struggle with a female soldier on patrol in the airport terminal after he had earlier shot and wounded a police officer with an air pistol during a police check on the opposite side of Paris.
The man’s father and brother were taken into police custody, a judicial source said. BFM TV, without giving a source, said the attacker had texted his father saying: “I’ve screwed up. I’ve shot a policeman.”
President Francois Hollande said the case has been turned over to anti-terrorism prosecutors and a number of operations are under way. The incident had shown the need for the “Sentinelle” security operation brought in after an outbreak of attacks by terrorists in 2015, he said.
More than 230 people have died in France in the past two years at the hands of attackers allied to the jihadist group Islamic State, whose strongholds in Syria and Iraq are being bombed by an international coalition including France.
These include coordinated bombings and shootings in November 2015 in Paris, when 130 people were killed and scores injured.
Strengthening France’s security is at the heart of the campaign for presidential elections in April and May, where centrist Emmanuel Macron is predicted to hold off a strong challenge from far-right-winger Marine Le Pen, who advocates tough measures against illegal immigrants and radical Islamists.
Saturday’s train of events began at Stains, near Le Bourget airport in northern Paris, where the man fled in a car after he shot and wounded a police officer at a road check.
Soon afterward, he was involved in a carjacking in another Paris suburb, Vitry, where he threatened customers of a bar, Interior Minister Bruno Le Roux told reporters.
Soon afterward at Orly, he tried to seize a Famas assault rifle from a young female air force member who was patrolling the airport as part of the army’s “Sentinelle” security operation.
The man and the soldier fell to the ground after an “extremely violent attack,” an army spokesman said. In the ensuing struggle on the ground, other members of the patrol opened fire, killing him, the spokesman said.
One witness, who gave only his first name of Dominique, said he saw a man seize the female soldier by the arm and take hold of her weapon. Her comrades tried to reason with her assailant.
“We ran off, down the staircase. Afterward, we heard two shots,” he told BFM TV.
“Sentinelle” is the government’s stepped-up security response to the January 2015 Islamist attack on the satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo that resulted in the deaths of 12 people. The operation was reinforced after the November 2015 attacks in Paris.
Saturday’s attacks would have no impact on a trip to Paris by Prince William, second-in-line to the British throne, and his wife, Kate, who were due to end a twoday visit to the French capital on Saturday, a British spokesman said. The British royals earlier on Saturday met some of the survivors of the Paris attacks in a visit to a military hospital.
An international rugby match, France versus Wales, was due to take place in Paris later on Saturday, which the British royals were due to attend.
Around 3,000 passengers were evacuated from Orly, France’s second-busiest airport, after the incident as security services sealed off the terminal and swept it for bombs, but no explosives were found. Crowds of passengers waited outside.
No one else was injured at the airport.
Flights were suspended from both airport terminals and some flights were diverted to Paris’s Charles de Gaulle airport, airport operator ADP said.
But normal flight operations were later said to be resuming, the Paris airports operator said.
Also on Saturday,11 candidates got the go-ahead to run in France’s presidential election in a vote that Macron remains favorite to win.
French voters go the polls on April 23 and May 7 in the two-round election, which is being closely followed outside France as another test of popular discontent with traditional parties and institutions like the European Union.
The campaign has been highly unpredictable, dominated by a fraud investigation into conservative FranÇois Fillon, which has cost him his place as election front-runner.
French voters will have a choice of 11 candidates after the country’s Constitutional Council announced the list of contenders that had met conditions to stand.
In addition to leading candidates Macron, Fillon and far-right leader Marine Le Pen, the list included three candidates who passed the threshold of 500 elected officials just in time: Jacques Cheminade and Philippe Poutou of small far-left parties and centrist lawmaker Jean Lasalle.
The expiry of the deadline would put paid to any further attempts by members of the conservative Republicans party to seek an alternative candidate to Fillon, who is being investigated on suspicion of misusing public funds to pay his wife and children and over a gift of expensive suits.
A BVA poll for Orange released on Saturday showed Macron was best placed to win. He was second in firstround voting intentions, a point behind the National Front’s Le Pen who had 26%, but would win a runoff against his far-right opponent 62-38, according to the survey.
Fillon has slipped to third in the polls, recording 19.5% in the BVA survey, suggesting he would fail to reach the run-off.
Benoit Hamon, the ruling Socialist party’s candidate, ranked fourth with 12.5%, the poll showed, only slightly ahead of radical left-wing contender Jean-Luc Melenchon.
Several thousand supporters cheered Melenchon on Saturday at a central Paris rally billed as a show of force after he spurned Hamon’s overtures to join him.
The left’s divisions have favored the emergence of Macron, a 39-year-old former economy minister of incumbent Socialist President FranÇois Hollande.
Macron on Saturday said he wanted to restore military service to France for some 600,000 young people each year as part of efforts to face a world entering an era of “turbulence” comparable to the Cold War.
The shooting at Orly refocused attention on security, a major concern after a series of attacks by Islamists.
Le Pen blames immigration and shortcomings in the EU for contributing to security risks, and has promised to take France out of the euro zone and hold a referendum on its EU membership.
Her popularity has been a concern for international investors, and a rise in her ratings in another poll on Friday pushed the euro lower.