Third death after attack on market

A third person has died from wounds sustained during a shooting attack on a popular Christmas market in Strasbourg, French authorities said on Thursday.

A further 13 people are injured, with five still in a critical condition, the local prefecture said in a statement.

One of the injured has been declared brain dead.

The suspected attacker, a 29-year-old Strasbourg native named Cherif Chekatt, opened fire at the eastern city’s annual Christmas market on Tuesday night.

Police and soldiers exchanged fire with Chekatt, who was wounded but managed to escape.

Hundreds of police in France have been searching for him since and the government has raised its security alert for terrorism to its highest level.

Border controls have been reinforced in Germany and Switzerland, where the career criminal has previous convictions, and hundreds of additional soldiers have been deployed to secure other Christmas markets across France.

More than 700 police were involved in the second day of the manhunt, scouring Strasbourg, which lies on the west bank of the Rhine river, and the surrounding region.

Asked if police had been instructed to catch Chekatt dead or alive, government spokesperson Benjamin Griveaux told CNews: “It doesn’t matter. The best thing would be to find him as quickly as possible.”

It took police four months to track down Salah Abdesalam, the prime surviving suspect from the November 2015 militant attack on Paris, in an apartment in Brussels.

Witnesses told investigators that Chekatt, who is of North African descent, had cried out “Allahu Akbar” (God is Greater) as he opened fire on the Christmas market, a target Paris prosecutor Remy Heitz suggested may have been chosen for its religious symbolism.

Chekatt’s police photo shows a bearded man with a prayer bruise on the centre of his forehead. He has 27 convictions for theft and violence.

Neighbours on the housing estate where Chekatt’s family lives described the suspect as a typical young man who dressed in jogging pants and trainers rather than Islamic robes.