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Wales Online
Wales Online
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Press Association & Jillian MacMath

Four dead in Paris after knife-wielding man attacks police headquarters

At least four people have reportedly died following an attack by a man armed with a knife at police headquarters in Paris.

The attacker, believed to be a staff member, was shot dead, a French police union official said.

It was not immediately clear how far the assailant got inside the building, which is located across the street from Notre Dame Cathedral.

Police union official Loic Travers said another officer shot the attacker "in a situation that appears to be self-defence".

The motives of the midday attack on Thursday are not yet known.

Another police union official, Jean-Marc Bailleul, told French broadcaster BFM TV that information was still coming in but he understood the attacker was a police department employee.

French media reported that a staff member carried out the attack with a ceramic knife in part of the headquarters which is not open to the public.

The attack came a day after thousands of officers marched in Paris to protest against low wages, long hours and increasing suicides in their ranks.

France's interior minister and the Paris prosecutor were on their way to the scene.

Extremists have repeatedly targeted French police in France in recent years.

In 2017, a gunman opened fire on the Champs-Elysees boulevard, killing one officer before he was shot to death.

In 2016, an attack inspired by the Islamic State group killed a police officer and his companion, an administrator, at their home in front of their child.

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