Authorities say a 69-year-old suspect was arrested after the shooting at a Kurdish cultural center in Paris.
At least three people have been killed and three others wounded when a gunman opened fire on a Kurdish cultural center in Paris, as President Emmanuel Macron denounced the “heinous” attack on France’s Kurds.
Several shots were fired on Rue d’Enghien around noon (1100 GMT) on Friday, sowing panic on a street lined with small shops and cafes in the French capital’s busy 10th arrondissement.
The three who died were Kurds, a lawyer for the Kurdish cultural center told the Reuters news agency. Three others were injured, one of them with life-threatening injuries.
Authorities said a 69-year-old former machinist was taken into custody as a suspect. The Paris prosecutor said the man had recently been released from custody while awaiting trial for an attack on a migrant camp in Paris a year ago, and that investigators were considering a possible racist motive for the shooting.
Protesters clash with French police during a demonstration near Rue d’Enghien [Sarah Meyssonnier/Reuters]
Later Friday, dozens of protesters took to the streets a short distance from the scene of the shootings. Police fired tear gas to drive back an angry crowd as projectiles were hurled at officers, garbage cans and restaurant tables were overturned and cars were damaged.
Reporting from Paris, Al Jazeera’s Natacha Butler said: “People here feel that that shooting was against them and against their community.”
President Emmanuel Macron said in a tweet that the Kurds in France were the target of the attack.
“The Kurds of France have been the target of a heinous attack in the heart of Paris. Our thoughts are with the victims, the people struggling to live, their families and loved ones,” Macron said in a tweet
Mathilde Panot, parliamentary leader of the hard-left political party France Unbowed, pointed the finger at the far right, calling it a “racist attack”.
The Minister of the Interior, Gerald Darmanin, visited the site of the attack. “There are few doubts [the gunman] it was aimed at foreigners. We need to know from the judicial investigation if it was specifically the Kurds, at the moment there is no evidence to prove it,” he told reporters.
The prosecutor’s office has reported that a 69-year-old man has been arrested in connection with the incident. [Sarah Meyssonnier/Reuters]
‘total panic’
Eyewitness Mehmet Dilek told Reuters that he first heard gunshots and then screams from a barber shop in front of the cultural center. Bystanders subdued the gunman as he reloaded, he added.
A local shopkeeper told AFP he had heard seven or eight gunshots on Rue d’Enghien in the 10th arrondissement, saying: “It was total panic. We locked ourselves inside.”
The Kurdish community center, called Center Ahmet Kaya, is used by a charity that works to integrate the Kurdish population in the Paris region.
ALERT – Shooting in Paris: several injured in the 10th arrondissement.
Police on scene. A suspect arrested. pic.twitter.com/mbQFl2a0vf
— Clément Lanot (@ClementLanot) December 23, 2022
Members of the Kurdish community in Paris said police had recently warned them of threats to Kurdish targets and called for justice after the shooting.
Kurdish leaders also called for better protection for their community, an issue for Kurds in France since the killing of three Kurdish women a decade ago.
“The Kurds, wherever they live, should be able to live in peace and security,” Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo said on Twitter. “Now more than ever, Paris is by his side in these dark times.”
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz condemned the attack on Twitter. “A terrible act shook Paris and France today,” he said. “My thoughts are with the victims and their families.”