Paris shooting: Three dead and several injured in attack

A gunman has opened fire in central Paris, killing three people and wounding three others.

The attacker targeted a Kurdish cultural centre and shot members of the local community. A possible racist motive is being investigated.

A suspect, aged 69, was quickly arrested and it soon emerged he had been freed from prison recently.

Clashes later broke out between police and a group who had gathered at the scene in the aftermath of the attack.

Footage showed people starting fires in the middle of the street and smashing car windows, with officers clad in riot gear responding by throwing tear gas.

The unrest came after a man, described by witnesses as tall, white and elderly, shot dead two men and a woman on Rue d'Enghien in the 10th district of Paris.

Of the three people injured, one was said to be in a critical condition and the others were receiving treatment for serious injuries.

There is no confirmed motive for the shooting, but Paris Prosecutor Laure Beccuau said the suspect had previously been charged with racist violence.

That incident - in which he attacked tents at a migrant camp in Paris with a sword - took place at Bercy on 8 December 2021. It was not clear why he had recently been released.

French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin, who earlier travelled to the scene, said there was currently no known link between the suspect and "ultra-right" groups.

Local Mayor Alexandra Cordebard said the gunman was also wounded in the shooting and that three places had come under fire: the Kurdish community centre, a restaurant and a hairdresser. Two people were shot in the salon.

"We were walking in the street and heard gunshots," a witness, Ali Dalek, told the BBC. "We turned around and saw people running left and right.

"And then, five or six minutes later, because we know people who work at the hair salon, we went in and we saw that they had arrested a guy."

Another witness, a shopkeeper, told AFP she had locked herself in. She said she had heard seven or eight bursts of gunfire.

Police eventually detained the suspect without resistance and reportedly recovered the weapon used in the attack. Prosecutors said they had opened a murder investigation.