20 Jun 2012

French bank gunman frees hostages

A man who seized four hostages in a bank in the southwestern French city of Toulouse has freed two people, according to police.

Officials say the gunman said he was a member of al-Qaeda and armed with explosives.

The man, known to police for a record of petty offences and psychological problems, released two female hostages after receiving food and water in the early afternoon, police sources said.

The man, demanded to speak to the elite Raid police unit that shot Islamist gunman Mohamed Merah.

In March, Merah, who claimed he was trained by al-Qaeda, killed seven people in Toulouse before he was shot dead by Raid police, just yards from the scene of Wednesday’s bank siege.

The man took the hostages, who included the bank manager, in a branch of French bank CIC around mid-morning and fired a shot after an attempted armed robbery apparently went wrong, UNSA police union official Cedric Delage said.

Two police sources said a second shot was fired in mid-afternoon.

Police sources said officers had identified the hostage-taker and brought in a friend and his sister to help with negotiations. He declined to speak to either of them.

“By choosing to carry this out where the Merah affair took place, it shows that this makes sense for him and has a particular symbolism,” said Christophe Caupenne, a former commando at Raid.

“The Merah affair was a psychological trigger for him so at some point he would act.”

One source said the suspect had a name of North African origin and had spent time in a psychiatric hospital.

Officials at CIC and the Interior Ministry declined to comment.

A man was shot dead by police in Toulouse in March

In March, Mohammed Merah shot dead three soldiers, a rabbi and three Jewish children in Toulouse.

He was later shot dead by police after a standoff at his home in the city in the same area as the CIC bank that was under siege on Wednesday.

In the wake of the shootings, the French authorities set up an investigation into whether Merah had accomplices and into possible Islamist indoctrination practices in prisons.

Merah filmed his attacks and sent the footage to police.

On 7 June, a man armed with a shotgun took hostage a security guard at the French weather service, Meteo France. The hostage-taker fired several shots and was seriously injured when police returned fire.

His hostage was uninjured.