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Champs Élysées sealed off after car hits police van in Paris Champs Élysées: anti-terror inquiry opened after car hits police van
(35 minutes later)
Police have sealed off the area around the Champs-Élysées in central Paris after a car hit a police van and briefly caught fire. France’s anti-terror prosecutor has opened an investigation after a car rammed into a police van on the Champs-Élysées in central Paris.
French media quoted police sources as saying the collision appeared to have been deliberate. No officers or bystanders were hurt and the car’s driver was arrested, BFMTV reported. The French interior minister, Gérard Collomb, said the driver of the car, who was carrying a handgun, was killed in what he described as “an attempted attack” on a convoy of police vehicles driving down the avenue.
There was no immediate information on whether the alleged attacker was armed. The car also held several rounds of ammunition and a gas canister, Collomb added. An interior ministry spokesman, Pierre-Henry Brandet, said bomb disposal experts were at the scene.
A nearby metro station was also closed on Monday afternoon. The area, popular with tourists, has been on high security alert since a police officer was shot and killed on the Champs-Élysées in April. No other injuries, including to the police officers inside the van, were reported in the ramming, which a police source told BFM TV resembled a “kamikaze attack”.
Eric Favereau, a journalist with the newspaper Libération who was on a motorbike behind the convoy, said he saw the police vans at a standstill near the Grand Palais exhibition hall and a car blocking their path, followed by an explosion.
Faverau said he saw flames coming from the car and police smashing its windows and dragging the driver out. He said some police then fired on the man while others used fire extinguishers to put out the blaze.
Police cleared the area and cordoned off the Champs-Élysées, also closing a nearby metro station. The area, popular with tourists, has been on high security alert since a police officer was shot and killed on the Champs-Élysées in April.
Days before the first round of France’s presidential election, Karim Cheurfi, a convicted criminal who carried a note defending Islamic State, used a Kalashnikov rifle to kill the police officer before being shot dead himself.