Paris: Man shot, wounded after attacking soldiers outside Louvre museum

A police union official said the attacker was carrying two backpacks and had two machetes.
A knife-wielding man shouting “Allahu akbar” attacked French soldiers on patrol near the Louvre Museum Friday in what officials described as a suspected terror attack. The soldiers first tried to fight off the attacker and then opened fire, shooting him five times. The attack at an entrance to a shopping mall that extends beneath the museum sowed panic and again highlighted the threat French officials say hangs over the country, which was hit repeatedly by extremist attacks in 2015 and 2016.
A police union official said the attacker was carrying two backpacks and had two machetes. He said the man launched himself at the soldiers when they told him that he could not bring his bags into the Carrousel du Louvre shopping mall underneath the world-famous museum where the “Mona Lisa” hangs.
“That’s when he got the knife out and that’s when he tried to stab the soldier,” said the official, Yves Lefebvre. The four soldiers first tried to fight off the attacker before opening fire, said Benoit Brulon, a spokesman for the military force that patrols Paris and its major tourist attractions. The French interior ministry said anti-terrorism prosecutors are investigating. There were no immediate details about the identity of the attacker. “Allahu akbar” is the Arabic phrase for “God is great.”
The patrols – numbering about 3,500 soldiers in the Paris area – were instituted following the January 2015 attacks on Paris’ satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and reinforced after Nov. 13 suicide bomb and gun attacks that left 130 people dead at the city’s Bataclan concert hall and other sites. The attacker slightly injured one of the soldiers, in the scalp, officials said. Another soldier opened fire, gravely wounding the attacker.
“He is wounded in the stomach,” said police chief Michel Cadot. “He is conscious and he was moving.”
Checks of the man’s two backpacks found they didn’t contain any explosives, he said. Cadot said a second person who was “acting suspiciously” also was arrested but appears not to have been linked to the attack. Restaurant worker Sanae Hadraoui, 32, was waiting for breakfast at the Louvre’s restaurant complex when she heard the first gunshot, followed by another and then a couple more.
“I hear a shot. Then a second shot. Then maybe two more. I hear people screaming, “Evacuate! Evacuate!” “They told us to evacuate. I told my colleagues at the McDonalds. We went downstairs and then took the emergency exit.” Hadraoui, who has worked at the Louvre for seven years, said the evacuation was orderly. She was smoking a cigarette when her managers told her people were going back inside.
The museum in the center of Paris is one of the French capital’s biggest tourist attractions. Police sealed off entrances around where the attack took place and closed the area to vehicles, snarling traffic in a busy part of central Paris. Officers shooed away confused tourists. Interior Ministry spokesman Pierre-Henry Brandet said about 1,000 people were inside the actual museum and were held inside in safe areas before the all-clear was given and they were allowed to move around as normal again.
Exterminator Olivier Majewski says he was just leaving his scooter in the parking lot beneath the Louvre when he saw a crush of people running and screaming “there’s been a terror attack.” The 53-year-old says he hid for about 15 minutes before gingerly making his way upstairs.
“They were panicked,” he said.

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After Paris attacks, fugitive slipped through police dragnet

Hours after the synchronised attacks that terrorised Paris, French police questioned and released the suspect who is now the focus of an international manhunt, officials have said.

Saleh Abdelslam, 26, was one of three men in a getaway car, headed for France’s border with Belgium, when police pulled them over after daybreak Saturday. The French president had already announced new border controls to prevent the perpetrators from escaping.

Hours had passed since investigators identified Abdelslam as the renter of a Volkswagen Polo that carried hostage—takers to the Paris theater where almost three-quarters of the 129 victims were killed.

It’s not clear why the local French police, known as gendarmes, didn’t take Abdelslam into custody. They checked his identification, but it's not known whether they had been informed of his apparent connection to the attacks.

“It was a simple check. There was no lookout notice at the time of the traffic stop,” a French police official told the AP yesterday.

Asked whether Abdelslam’s name had been shared over police networks by then, the official simply said: “I have no explanation.”

It may not have been the only missed opportunity before and after France’s deadliest extremist attack since World War II.

The day before the attacks, senior Iraqi intelligence officials warned France and other members of the US—led coalition fighting the Islamic State that assaults by the militant group could be imminent, according to a dispatch obtained by the AP.

Abu Bakr al—Baghdadi, the group’s leader, had ordered supporters to use guns and bombs and take hostages in the days ahead in coalition countries as well as Iran and Russia, Thursday’s dispatch said.

The dispatch did not say where or when the attacks might take place, and a senior French security official told the AP that French intelligence gets this kind of communication “all the time” and “every day.”

But Iraqi intelligence officials told the AP that they also shared specific details with French authorities before the attack including the size of a sleeper cell of militants they said was directing attackers sent back to France from Islamic State’s de—facto capital in Raqqa, Syria.

These additional details were not corroborated by French or Western security officials. But one US official said yesterday that the evident weaponry skill displayed by the attackers suggests that they might have received training somewhere.

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A turning point for France: Paris Deputy Mayor

It is the third day after the terrorist attacks in Paris in which over a hundred people were killed and scores injured. How would you assess the popular and official response to the crisis?

At the popular level, I would say that the people have reacted with dignity and strength. Even on Saturday people were out on the streets saying life will go on and we are not afraid. The people of Paris are even stronger than I knew them to be, so it is a really good feeling I have about that. At the level of the government, both at the national and the municipality level, we can be really proud of how the security forces, the police and all the people in the hospitals were really good and ready to react. We have to see the political reactions now.

Could you be more specific in your answer, especially as France is now under a state of emergency. Do you think that will change life as people know it because they will have to be constantly vigilant?

I definitely think the events are a turning point in France. It was not just a terror attack, but an act of war, so definitely things are going to change. We will need more security, but [we] must also find a balance between maintaining normal life and individual liberty, and security needs. This is going to be organised in the next few days in discussions between the City of Paris and the national government, but I am really optimistic that everything will be fruitful and for the best for people here.

Do you fear that the aim of the Daish, which is to sow differences among people, might be realized?

Actually, right now I think that they have totally failed. I have seen my country and my city really united this weekend, whatever peoples religion or place of origin. I am much more afraid about what bad politicians can do with that event [ie, the attacks] if they try to strengthen [deepen] differences between people.

Do you think that the parties of the right could get oxygen from this event?

We are going to be running for election in December so we will see at that time. They are trying to play with that event to get some more votes. I [would] just say that the people who are going to be voting should know that this is no solution. The far right are interested in dividing French society, they have no vision for our society, and we have to stick together whoever we are and wherever we come from.

You are a member of the Green Party. Do you think that COP21 will be held ?

It is very important that we don’t cancel this really important meeting for the planet and the communities of the world. Anyway, the meeting will need security and right now the state is preparing to make it happen. And again with the new security measures questions will be raised about whether we will have the 29 November march. Right now we don’t know if it is going to be held. We need some more days to think and discuss about it.

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G20-Fight against Islamic State dominates as world leaders meet in Turkey

U.S. President Barack Obama and other world leaders arrived in Turkey on Sunday for a summit that has taken on new urgency after attacks in Paris pushed the fight against Islamic State militants to the top of the agenda.

Mr. Obama, who called the attacks "an outrageous attempt to terrorize civilians" on the eve of his departure, faces the question of how the West should respond now Islamic State poses a clear threat far beyond its strongholds in Syria and Iraq.

Washington already expects France to retaliate by taking on a larger role in the U.S.-led coalition's bombing campaign against Islamic State.

But Mr. Obama is also seeking to coax other European and Middle Eastern countries into more tangible steps to show their military commitment, a U.S. official said before the President embarked on his nine-day foreign trip.

Mr. Obama will hold a bilateral meeting with Saudi Arabia's King Salman at the summit on Sunday evening, a White House official said. The two leaders committed to increase support for "the moderate Syrian opposition" in a call late last month and affirmed the need to cooperate in fighting Islamic State.

Their last meeting took place in early September in Washington.

The two-day summit of the Group of 20 major economies brings Mr. Obama and fellow world leaders just 500 km (310 miles) from Syria, where a 4-1/2-year conflict has transformed Islamic State into a global security threat and spawned Europe's largest migration flows since World War Two.

The coordinated attacks by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris on Friday puts Mr. Obama and other leaders of the Group of 20 major economies under increased pressure to find common cause.

It remains to be seen, however, whether the United States itself has an appetite for much deeper involvement after already stepping up air strikes and committing small numbers of special operations troops to northern Syria to advise opposition forces in the fight against Islamic State.

The Paris carnage, in which 129 people were killed in attacks on a concert hall, restaurants, bars and a sports stadium, also poses a major challenge for Europe, with populist leaders rushing to demand an end to an influx of refugees and migrants from the Middle East and Africa.

DIFFERENCES OVER SYRIA

Russia, the United States and powers from Europe and the Middle East outlined a plan on Saturday after meeting in Vienna for a political process in Syria leading to elections within two years, but differences remained on key issues such as President Bashar al-Assad's fate.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told reporters in Turkey on Sunday that the Vienna talks and signals from the world's capitals after the Paris attacks showed greater understanding on the joint fight against terrorism.

There had not, however, been a "breakthrough" in positions, he said.

Mr. Obama was due to hold bilateral talks with Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan and later, at a working dinner with fellow leaders, to have in-depth discussions on Syria, ranging from counter-terrorism to the refugee crisis.

Turkey has seen its worst nightmare unfold in Syria. Ankara faces not only the threat from Islamic State, but also the prospect of Assad, shielded by Russia and Iran, holding on to power, while Kurdish rebels backed by the United States make territorial gains.

Mr. Obama is likely try to ease differences with Mr. Erdogan over the fight against Islamic State, especially the role of Kurdish fighters in northern Syria.

Turkey, which opened its air bases in July to the U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State, sees advances by Syrian Kurds along an area abutting Turkey as a threat to its security, fearing they could stoke separatism among its own Kurds.

Although the G20 usually focuses on economic issues, the summit comes not only after the Paris attacks but also two weeks after a suspected bomb attack on a Russian airliner killed 224 people in the Sinai Peninsula.

It also comes just over a month after two suspected Islamic State suicide bombers blew themselves up in Ankara, killing more than 100 people in Turkey's worst such attack.

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