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Saturday October 31, 2020
France is in shock after three alleged Islamist killings in the vicinity of a cathedral in Nice. But there is already another incident: an Orthodox priest is killed in front of his church. Now they catch a suspect. His motive is unclear.
A suspect has been arrested following the firearms attack on an Orthodox priest in the French city of Lyon. The person is in police custody, Lyon prosecutor Nicolas Jacquet said Saturday night. Consequently, the suspect did not have a weapon with him when he was arrested. According to the police, the Greek priest was attacked with a sawed-off shotgun and was seriously injured in the afternoon. According to the police, he was about to close his church when he was attacked. The 52-year-old man’s condition is serious. The attacker was initially on the run.
The person detained could be the person described by the witnesses, the prosecutor said. The review is still ongoing. The motive for the attack is not yet clear, currently no possibility is excluded, said Jacquet. According to investigators, the priest was shot twice in the chest from a very close distance.
Only on Thursday three people were killed in an alleged terrorist attack on a church in Nice. The knife attack had caused horror throughout the world. French President Emmanuel Macron described the deadly attack as an “Islamist terrorist attack”, and the anti-terror prosecutor’s office launched an investigation. Prime Minister Jean Castex proclaimed the highest level of terror alert for the country. The head of state, Macron, announced that the number of soldiers deployed to protect places of worship and schools would be increased from 3,000 to 7,000.
Incitement against France in Muslim countries
Due to the reissue of the Muhammad cartoons by the satirical newspaper “Charlie Hebdo”, the mood in Muslim countries has recently heated up against France. In countries like Pakistan and Bangladesh, thousands of people recently took to the streets in anti-French protests and burned photographs of Macron.
After the murder of a history professor two weeks ago in Paris, Macron had spoken out in favor of showing the cartoons in the context of free speech. Educator Samuel Paty was beheaded by a murderer for showing cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in class.
Macron attacks Erdogan
Meanwhile, Macron attacked Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, accusing him of a “warlike” attitude towards NATO partners. In an interview with the Arab television station Al-Jazeera, Macron said he expected things to “calm down”. To do this, the Turkish president must respect France and the European Union and their values, Macron said. Furthermore, Erdogan “should not lie or insult.”
Erdogan called for a boycott of French products last week. The background for this was stricter controls announced by Macron on mosques and other Muslim institutions after the allegedly Islamist-motivated murder of a history professor near Paris.
