Reports: 5 dead in tense hostage standoff at Paris kosher supermarket

Source http://www.jpost.com/International/Second-hostage-taking-at-Paris-kosher-supermarket-387225
PARIS - An armed man took several hostages and one person was wounded in a shootout at a kosher supermarket in eastern Paris on Friday, police sources confirmed on Friday. There are conflicting reports as to whether there anyone was killed in the incident.

A woman in tears approached French police outside the kosher supermarket where hostages were held captive by a gunman in northeast Paris, saying her 37-year-old daughter just managed to call from the supermarket and told her five people have already been killed, the BBC reported.

The daughter said many hostages were in the basement of the supermarket. The conversation was interrupted by other hostages making the woman stop talking for her own safety.

There is no official confirmation of these claims.

It was not immediately clear whether there was a link between that gunman and the two suspects wanted for 12 killings at the Charlie Hebdo satirical weekly on Wednesday.

However a police source said the hostage-taker resembled the man suspected of killing a policewoman in a southern suburb of Paris on Thursday. That man in turn is believed to be a member of the same jihadist group as the two Charlie Hebdo suspects.

The exact number of hostages taken was unclear. Local media spoke of at least five. The police source said the man was equipped with automatic weapons.

Police immediately cordoned off the area and a helicopter was flying overhead.


North of the capital French anti-terrorist police sealed off a town and helicopters hovered overhead after a police source said the two men believed to have carried Wednesday's attack on the satirical Charlie Hebdo newspaper took at least one person hostage in a small print works.

Separately, Paris police named a man they were looking for in connection with Thursday's killing of a policewoman as 32 year-old Amedy Coulibaly. They said were also looking for a 26 year-old woman called Hayat Boumeddiene. They described both as armed and dangerous.