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French train shooting: hero

passengers overpower gunman

S AT U R DAY 22 AUGUST 2015


Three American soldiers and a British businessman are being hailed as
heroes after restraining a heavily armed attacker on a train in France.

Object 1

Three American soldiers and a

British businessman are being hailed as heros after overpowering a heavily


armed attacker on a train in France.
Chris Norman, a 62-year-old British consultant, told reporters he had been
sitting in the same carriage as the Americans when they heard a shot: "I
looked up and saw a guy carrying an AK-47 or at least I assume it was some
kind of machine-gun."
He added: "It could have been a real carnage, there's no question about
that."
Alek Skarlatos, a 22-year-old member of the U.S. National Guard, said his

friend, who is also in the military, had been injured while he grappled with
the gunman.
He said: "I just got back from Afghanistan last month, and this was my
vacation from Afghanistan."
Photos from the scene show one of the injured, believed to be a US soldier,
and the attacker being arrested.
Known to security services
It has been revealed the gunman is known to European authorities as a
suspected Islamist militant if the identity he has given is correct.
French and Spanish press have named the gunman as Ayoub El-Kahzzani
tonight. It's thought he recently travelled to Syria yet was not considered a
sufficient threat to put under surveillance.
It has been reported that the suspect was known to three European
intelligence agencies, and Belgium has announced extra security patrols on
its high-speed trains.
France's interior minister said on Saturday that if he was telling the truth
"he is a 26-year-old man of Moroccan nationality identified by the Spanish
authorities to French intelligence services in February 2014 because of his
connections to the radical Islamist movement".
The man Spanish authorities had under surveillance left Spain for France in
2014, travelled to Syria, and then back to France, a Spanish counterterrorism source said on Saturday.
In Spain, he lived in the southern port of Algeciras and appeared to have
stayed in the country for about a year, the source said.

Photo credit: Christina Cathleen Coons / @FreedomFilmLLC


Three people were injured in the attack, two of them seriously, but that
figure is likely to have been higher if the men had not stopped the attacker.
Commending the involvement of the soldiers, French Interior Minister
Bernard Cazeneuve said, "Without their courage we would have surely
faced a terrible tragedy."

United States President Barack Obama said expressed his "profound


gratitude" to the train passengers, including US military personel and a Brit
businessman "who selflessly subdued the attacker."
France on high-alert
Earlier reports said a Brit was one of the injured, but the Foreign office has
said it has no reports of any additional British involvement.
Officials said the attacker was arrested after the shooting when the
Amsterdam to Paris train stopped at Arras station in northern France.
A French ministry spokesman said the gunman's motives were not known.
French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said the French anti-terrorism
prosecutor was investigating the incident.
Read more: France's problem with Islamist extremism
France has been on high security alert since Islamist militants killed 17
people in and around Paris in January.
Twelve people were shot dead at the offices of controversial satirical
magazine Charlie Hebdo and five were killed during a siege at a Jewish
supermarket.
In June, a man who had been investigated for links to Islamist
radicals caused an explosion by driving his car into an area which had
flammable liquids and beheaded a man, believed to be his boss.
Posted by Thavam

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