A shooting and hostage-taking attack has taken place on Friday at a kosher market on the eastern edge of Paris, France’s anti-terrorism prosecutor said.
An Interior Ministry spokesman told RTL-TV that police believe five individuals were taken hostage, possibly including a child.
French police identified the suspects as Amedy Coulibaly and his girlfriend, Hayat Boumeddienne.
French President Francois Hollande ordered the country’s top security official to the scene, an official in the presidency told The Associated Press. The police official declined to be named when discussing the unfolding situation.
The incident came as a separate manhunt continued for a man suspected of shooting a police officer to death on Thursday morning just south of the capital in Montrouge.
[contextly_sidebar id=”oSgAFmF1mO2QBNx07q4DfCr41hCB5eQV”]There had been reports earlier Friday that the suspect, who fatally shot the officer after a car crash and then fled on foot, had been identified. French television said the Montrouge suspect was believed to be the one inside the Paris grocery store on Friday, and that he was holding several hostages.
Also Friday, French television reported that the suspect was believed to be an acquaintance of the alleged gunmen in Wednesday’s massacre at a French satirical newspaper.
A police source also told the Reuters news organization that the gunman and the Paris shooting suspects Cherif Kouachi, 32, and Said Kouachi, 34, were members of the same jihadist group.
The gunman allegedly fatally wounded the female officer after a car crash and then fled on foot in the southern Paris suburb of Montrouge Thursday morning.
French television reports said Friday that at least two people had been arrested in connection with the attack. BFM-TV, citing law enforcement officials, said the suspected gunman was believed to be an acquaintance of the Kouachi brothers. RTL-TV, citing security sources, said the Montrouge gunman knew Cherif Kouachi very well.
CBS News homeland security correspondent Bob Orr reports Cherif and Said Kouachi were on U.S. no-fly and terror watch lists and were well known to French counter-terrorism officials before Wednesday’s attack.
Cherif Kouachi’s arrest made him the more well-known of the two. But Said Kouachi may actually have stronger ties to al Qaeda terrorists.
U.S. sources said French investigators have evidence Said Kouachi traveled to Yemen in 2011 and linked up with the terrorist affiliate al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, Orr reports. CBS News has been told Said “spent several months” in Yemen training with the group known as AQAP.
During Said’s time in Yemen, AQAP’s terror operations were being run by the U.S.-born radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaki.
Awlaki was the inspiration behind Nidal Hassan’s massacre at Fort Hood, Texas. Awlaki also led the failed attempts to hit the U.S. with bombs smuggled onto jetliners inside underwear and computer printers.
It’s not clear if Said Kouachi had any direct dealings with Awlaki before returning to France in 2011. Awlaki was killed by a U.S. drone strike on Sept. 30 the same year.
Investigators believe Said Kouachi returned home with the intention of using his training to carry out an attack on a target in France. But, law enforcement officials are struggling to explain the three-year gap between Said Kouachi’s homecoming and the mass shooting at Charlie Hebdo.
Investigators don’t know if the brothers carried out the massacre on direct orders from AQAP. It’s possible the suspects selected their own target and timing. In either case the attack is one of deadliest linked to al Qaeda in a decade.
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Source: CBS