Paris shooting: perpetrator says he acted because he is racist

The 69-year-old man suspected of having shot dead three people at a Kurdish cultural centre in Paris on Friday has told police that he acted because he is racist. This was stated by a source close to the case on Saturday.

According to the source, the suspect was apprehended with a bag containing "two or three loaded magazines and a box of 45-calibre bullets with at least 25 rounds of ammunition," the source confirmed to the newspaper Journal du Dimanche. 

The man opened fire at noon on Friday in rue d'Enghien near a Kurdish cultural centre in the 10th arrondissement of the French capital. Three people were killed. One person is in bad shape. Two others were injured. The suspect was also wounded, the Paris prosecutor's office stated. 

An investigation has been opened into murder, attempted murder, intentional violence with weapons and violation of the weapons law. 

The man is known to prosecutors. He was sentenced to 12 months in prison in June for gun violence in 2016, but he appealed that sentence. In December 2021, he was charged with gun violence, premeditated and racist, after allegedly attacking migrants with a knife at a camp in Paris and cutting their tents, a police source said.

After a year in pre-trial detention, he was released on 12 December, as required by law, and placed under judicial supervision, the Paris prosecutor's office said.

On Saturday morning, hundreds of protesters from the Kurdish community marched in Rue d'Enghien, RTL France reported. They scanned the names of the victims of the shooting. There were also protests on Friday, with incidents occurring between protesters and security forces.

^{Supporters and members of the Kurdish community hold portraits of victims Emine Kara and Mir Perwer during a demonstration a day after a gunman opened fire at a Kurdish cultural centre killing three people, at The Place de la Republique in Paris on December 24, 2022. Emine Kara was a leader of the Kurdish Women's Movement in France and Mir Perwer, a political refugee and artist. The shots at the centre and a nearby hairdressing salon shortly before midday caused panic in the trendy 10th district of the French capital, a bustling area of shops and restaurants that is home to a large Kurdish population. The 69-year-old white French gunman told investigators he was racist, a source close to the case said.}

^{© JULIEN DE ROSA / AFP}