French police on Tuesday shot and seriously wounded an unarmed woman at a train station in Paris during morning rush hour.
The incident came with the country on its maximum alert for potential attacks but with the police also under scrutiny over recent fatal shoot-ings of suspects.
Witnesses said the 38-year-old woman, who was wearing a hijab, recited “Allahu akbar” and said “you will all die”, a police source said, adding that “police fired because they feared for their safety”.
After passengers on a suburban train travelling from the eastern suburbs to Paris alerted police, agents managed to “isolate” the woman at the Bibliotheque Francois Mitterrand station on the capital’s south bank which was evacuated, the source said.
Officers fired eight rounds at the woman, causing serious injury They ordered her to sit on the ground and stop moving, Paris police chief Laurent Nunez told reporters. But instead, he said, she moved towards them and ignored an order to show her hands.
Two police officers then fired eight rounds at the woman, inflicting a life-threatening injury to her abdomen, the prosecutor’s office said. It had earlier said that one officer had fired only one shot. No explosives or other arms were found on the woman who was taken to hospital, the police source said.
Police have launched two investigations, prosecutors said. One will probe the woman’s actions, while another is to elucidate whether the police’s firearm use was justified.
Government spokesman Olivier Veran said that there had been “at least three” calls from passengers to rail operator SNCF, which in turn alerted police.—AFP
