Knife attack in locked-down France leaves 2 dead, 5 injured
PARIS — A man wielding a knife attacked residents of a French town while they ventured out to shop amid a nationwide coronavirus lockdown Saturday, killing two people and wounding five others in an act that led authorities to open a terrorism inquiry.
France’s counterterrorism prosecutor’s office said the assailant was arrested near the scene of the attack in the town of Romans-surIsere, south of Lyon, as he was kneeling on the sidewalk praying in Arabic.
The office said one of his acquaintances also was detained.
Prosecutors did not identify the suspect. They said he had no identifying documents but claimed to be Sudanese and to have been born in 1987.
During a subsequent search of his home, authorities found handwritten documents that included arguments about religion and a complaint about living in a “country of unbelievers,” officials said.
The prosecutor’s office did not confirm reports that the man shouted “Allahu akbar” (God is great) as he stabbed and slashed people.
Like the entire population of France, Romanssur-Isere’s residents have been ordered to stay home save for a few exceptions. The victims were doing their food shopping, one of the permitted outside activities, on the street that has bakeries and grocery stores, the prosecutor’s office said.
There have been a number of knife attacks in France in recent months. In January, French police shot and injured a man in Metz who was waving a knife and shouting “Allahu akbar.”
Two days earlier, another man was shot dead by police after he stabbed one person fatally and wounded two others in a Paris suburb.
It is unclear whether the suspect in Saturday’s attack had psychological problems or any links to extremism.
In Britain: Lawyer and lawmaker Keir Starmer was elected leader of Britain’s main opposition Labour Party on Saturday.
Starmer, 57, comes from Labour’s center-left wing, and his election marks a shift from the more strongly socialist course set by his predecessor, Jeremy Corbyn.
Starmer faces the challenge of reuniting a party divided over the policies and legacy of Corbyn. The outgoing leader was elected party chief in 2015 on a wave of grassroots enthusiasm.
Starmer has been the party’s spokesman on Brexit. Labour has been out of office for a decade that has brought the country three Conservative prime ministers — David Cameron, Theresa May and Boris Johnson.