A man labelled a terrorist has been shot dead by French police on the anniversary of the Charlie Hebdo attacks.
The man walked into a police station in Goutte d’Or, in the 18th arrondissement of Paris, near Montmartre, and threatened police with a meat cleaver. He allegedly shouted “Allahu Akbar!” (God is Great) before being shot by police.
The man was later found to be wearing a fake suicide vest and, in a piece of paper found on his body, he “pledged allegiance” to the so-called Islamic State and vowed revenge for French “attacks in Syria”, AFP reported.
Officials have named him as convicted thief, Sallah Ali, born in Morocco.
Just minutes before he was shot French President Francois Hollande had praised police in a speech on last year’s killings which saw gunmen murder 17 people in attacks on Charlie Hebdo magazine and a Jewish supermarket.
In his address, made at Paris’s police headquarters, Hollande said 5000 extra police and gendarmes would be added to existing forces by 2017. It was an “unprecedented” strengthening of French security, he said.
