PARIS (AP) — The Latest on the Paris stabbing attack (all times local):
A bullet hole seen on the window of a cafe located near the area where the assailant of a knife attack was shot dead by police officers, in central Paris, Sunday May 13, 2018. The man behind a deadly knife attack in central Paris was born in Chechnya and had been on police radar for radicalism, and his parents have been detained for questioning, French authorities said Sunday. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)
9:30 p.m.
A private organization in the United States that monitors extremists online says the Islamic State’s news agency has released a video of a man who appears to be the Paris knifing suspect urging French citizens to pressure their government if they want attacks to end.
The alleged suspect in Saturday night’s rampage was shot and killed by police after he stabbed five people, one of them fatally.
French officials have said the assailant was a 20-year-old French citizen born in the Russian republic of Chechnya. They have not verified if he is the person featured in the 2 ½-minute-long video presumably released posthumously by the Amaq news agency Sunday.
The man in the video speaks in French and his face is covered except for his eyes.
He blames France for its role in the U.S.-led coalition against the Islamic State group and says: “If you want it (attacks) to end, pressure your government.”
The SITE Intelligence Group, a Maryland organization that monitors online extremist postings, highlighted and shared the video on Sunday.
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7:50 p.m.
The Islamic State’s Amaq news agency has released a video that a jihadist monitoring group says appears to show the suspect in Saturday night’s knife attack in Paris pledging allegiance to the group’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.
It is not clear if the man in the 2 ½-minute-long video released posthumously was indeed the attacker. His nose and mouth are covered, and he doesn’t identify himself by name.
Speaking in French, he calls on European Muslims to attack in their home countries if they are unable to emigrate to the caliphate. The video is undated, but a steady rain falls behind the man, as it did on Saturday in Paris.
The SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors jihadi online postings, said the Paris attacker is the person in the video Amaq released Sunday. IS claimed the attack suspect as one of its “soldiers” early Sunday.
French officials have said the suspect in the Paris attack is a 20-year-old French citizen who was born in the Russian republic of Chechnya. Police fatally shot him at the scene of the knifings that killed one person and wounded four.
Chechnya’s president identified him on Sunday as Khamzat Azimov.
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4:30 p.m.
A judicial official says a friend of the young man who rampaged through a central Paris neighborhood knifing passers-by has been detained in the eastern French city of Strasbourg.
The friend is the third person French police have taken in for questioning since the suspect in the Saturday night attack — a 20-year-old French citizen born in the Russian republic of Chechnya — killed one person and wounded four others.
The parents of the alleged attacker were picked up in the northern 18th district of Paris after their son was fatally shot by police.
The president of Chechnya identified the assailant as Khamzat Azimov.
The judicial official said the man detained Sunday was a friend of Azimov’s who also was born in 1997. The official wasn’t authorized to speak publicly and asked that he not be named.
— by Elaine Ganley in Paris.
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4:00 p.m.
A French judicial official says the young man who stabbed people in a lively Paris neighborhood didn’t have an arrest record but was on a watch list for potential radicalism.
The official said the parents of the alleged attacker, a 20-year-old French citizen who was born in the Russian republic of Chechnya, were still being questioned on Sunday.
They were detained at their residence in Paris’ northern 18th district after police shot and killed the suspect in Saturday night’s attack.
The judicial official wasn’t authorized to speak publicly and asked not to be named.
One person was killed and four others wounded in the knifing rampage near the Paris Garnier Opera house. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility.
Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov initially identified the suspect as Khasan Azimov. He updated the man’s first name, identifying him as Khamzat Azimov.
— by Elaine Ganley in Paris.
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3:15 p.m.
The head of the Russian republic of Chechnya says France bears responsibility for the fatal knife attack by a Chechnya-born man in Paris.
Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov said Sunday that he has been informed the dead attacker had received French citizenship and held a Russian passport until he was 14.
A French judicial official not authorized to speak publicly says the suspect was born in November 1997, which made him 20 now.
Kadyrov identified the suspect, whom police fatally shot, as Khasan Azimov.
Russian news agencies quoted the Chechen leader saying: “I consider it necessary to state that all responsibility for the fact that Khasan Azimov went on the road of crime lies completely with the authorities of France. He was only born in Chechnya, and his growing up, the formation of his personality, his views and persuasions occurred in French society.”
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12:15 p.m.
A man from Luxembourg was among four people wounded in a stabbing attack in the heart of Paris.
The foreign ministry of the small country north of France said in a statement Sunday that the man was given emergency treatment and he’s no longer in danger. The statement didn’t say whether he was in Paris as a tourist or resident or provide other details.
A 29-year-old man was killed in the attack and four people were wounded. Interior Minister Gerard Collomb said one of the injured underwent emergency surgery, and two friends were hospitalized with less serious injuries, but all are out of life-threatening danger.
The attacker was killed by police after the stabbing near the Opera Garnier on a busy Saturday night.
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10:40 a.m.
A French official says the Chechen man behind a deadly stabbing in central Paris had been on police radar for radicalism.
The judicial official told The Associated Press that while the alleged assailant had no record of arrests or convictions, he had been on a nationwide database of thousands of people suspected of links to radicalism. The official wasn’t authorized to be publicly named speaking about an ongoing investigation.
The assailant was killed by police after fatally stabbing one man and injuring four other people. The attacker’s parents are under questioning. Counterterrorism investigators are leading the probe into Saturday’s attack near the Paris opera house, which was claimed by the Islamic State group.
Authorities say the attacker was born in the majority Muslim Russian republic of Chechnya, which has long grappled with extremism. The Russian Embassy in France wouldn’t comment Sunday.
–By Angela Charlton in Paris.
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9:50 a.m.
French officials say the Russian-born man who attacked five people in central Paris with a knife had no police record and didn’t know his victims.
Interior Ministry spokesman Frederic de Lanouvelle told The Associated Press on Sunday that the man was born in the Russian republic of Chechnya in 1997 and did not have any previous convictions or arrests. He said the attacker had no link to his victims.
It wasn’t clear whether the assailant had been flagged for radicalism in the past. The Islamic State group claimed he was one of their fighters.
A police official said the assailant didn’t have identity documents with him during Saturday’s attack but was identified thanks to DNA. His parents were under questioning Sunday.
The assailant was killed after stabbing a 29-year-old man to death and injuring two women and two men. Their lives were out of danger Sunday.
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8:20 a.m.
A French judicial official says the man behind a deadly knife attack in central Paris was born in Chechnya in 1997, and his parents have been detained.
The official said Sunday the assailant had French nationality but was born in the Russian republic. The official, who wasn’t authorized to be publicly named, provided no other information on the attacker’s identity.
The French interior minister is holding a special security meeting Sunday to address the attack, which was claimed by the Islamic State group.
The attacker was killed by police after killing a 29-year-old man and injuring four others in a lively neighborhood near the Opera Garnier on Saturday night.
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