The health of the preschool children badly wounded in a mass knife attack by a Syrian refugee was “heading in the right direction,” French President Emmanuel Macron said on Friday, as the attacker refused to cooperate with police.
Four children — aged 22 months to three years old — were stabbed on Thursday in a playground in the Alpine town of Annecy, France, a normally idyllic lakeside spot popular with tourists.
As social media flooded with praise for rescue workers and a man hailed as a hero for chasing the attacker out of the area, sources close to the investigation said the attacker was remaining “totally silent” and “obstructing justice.”
Photo: Reuters
Prosecutors said they did not see a terror motive in the attack, but the rampage intensified tensions in France over immigration, with right-wing politicians seizing on the suspect’s origins.
Emmanuel Macron and his wife, Brigitte Macron, arrived in the southeastern city of Grenoble, where three of the children are being treated.
“Everything that I was told is heading in the right direction,” he said in Annecy after visiting the wounded toddlers in hospital, adding that news on their condition was “positive.”
‘BARBARIC’
“Attacking children is the most barbaric act there is,” he said, adding his “pride” over the work of rescuers.
The fourth child, a Dutch citizen, is in a hospital over the border in Geneva, Switzerland.
She is “out of danger,” Dutch Minister of Foreign Affairs Wopke Hoekstra said.
One of the injured children is British and the others are French.
Emmanuel Macron met some of the civilians being hailed as heroes for chasing the attacker from the playground.
“Pray for the children, I am doing fine,” wrote Henri, one of those who intervened, on Instagram as the hashtag #MerciHenri trended on social media.
Henri joined hundreds of people at a Mass held on Friday for the victims.
An impromptu shrine emerged overnight at the park, where people placed candles, flowers and messages.
“We are not prepared for these kinds of events,” local Leo Ganassali said as he laid flowers.
“I came as a child to play in this park and to see it in mourning is very, very tough,” he added.
The attacker was dressed in black and carrying a blade about 10cm long.
In a video taken by a bystander, he could be heard shouting: “In the name of Jesus Christ.”
INVESTIGATION
Annecy prosecutor Line Bonnet-Mathis said that the detention of the suspect, named as Abdalmasih H, who is under investigation for attempted murder, had been extended after a psychiatric examination.
Recently divorced from a Swedish national and in his early 30s, the suspect had previously lived for 10 years in Sweden where he was granted refugee status in April, security sources and his ex-wife said.
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