Three killed in shooting at Kurdish centre in Paris

Three people are dead and another is seriously injured after a shooting outside a Kurdish cultural centre in central Paris, for which a 69-year-old man with a history of racist acts is in custody, announced Paris prosecutor Laure Beccau.

Two other people are less seriously injured, as is the alleged perpetrator, who was arrested by police officers and taken to hospital, said the mayor of the district, Alexadra Cordebard.

The shooting took place outside a Kurdish cultural centre on Enghien Street in the capital's 10th arrondissement, near Republic Square. 

Beccau indicated that the arrested man has a police record, the most recent being the attack at the end of 2021 with a sabre on tents where migrants were sleeping in the capital's 12th arrondissement.

The man had just been provisionally released for those acts, said the prosecutor, who also added that, for now, they have found other records of him in the department of Seine-Saint-Denis, near Paris. 

"The racist motive for the shooting is part of the investigations," the prosecutor told reporters, not ruling out other motives, although for now she indicated that a terrorist motive is not being retained.

The investigation, for the moment, concerns murder and attempted murder, intentional acts of violence and violation of the law on possession of weapons, the prosecutor said.

At the request of President Emmanuel Macron, Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin, who was visiting a police station in the north of the country, immediately returned to the capital and will visit the scene.