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Seven people, including two British tourists, were wounded Sunday in Paris after being attacked by a man with a knife and an iron bar, police and other sources said.
A source close to the investigation said that the suspect, who is an Afghan national, was arrested.
"At this point, nothing shows any terrorist character in these attacks," the source added, adding that the attacker had targeted "strangers in the street".
Of the seven wounded, four are in critical condition, police said.
The incident occurred just after 23:00 (21:00 GMT) on the banks of a canal northeast of the capital.
A security guard from one of the two cinemas on either side of the La Villette Basin, which is part of the Ourcq Canal, said he saw a man who had already assaulted people chased by two others. men who were trying to stop him.
"He had an iron bar in his hand that he threw against the men who chased him, then he pulled out a knife," he told AFP.
Another eyewitness, Youssef Najah, 28, said he was walking along the canal near a bowling alley when he saw a man running and holding a knife. about 25 to 30 cm long.
"There were about 20 people chasing him, and they started throwing him petanque balls," said Najah, referring to popular sport in France, also known as boules.
"Four or five bullets hit him in the head, but they could not stop him," he added.
According to the same witness, the attacker then plunged into an alley where the man "tried to hide behind two British tourists. We told them, "Be careful, he has a knife." But they did not react ".
The two men were then attacked, he said.
– High alert –
A judicial investigation was opened for attempted murder, according to a judicial source.
This is the latest of several knife attacks that France has seen in recent months, terrorism being excluded in most cases.
On 23 August, a man stabbed his mother and sister and seriously injured a person in a town near Paris before being shot dead by police.
The motive for the violence remained uncertain despite the Islamic State (IS) claim that it was an attack by one of its fighters responding to the organization's propaganda. terrorist.
Authorities said the 36-year-old was suffering from severe mental health problems and had been on a terrorism watch list since 2016.
This attack occurred a few days after the arrest of an Afghan asylum seeker in Périgueux for a ransacking with a knife in which four people were injured, one seriously.
Police said the investigators "very quickly" rejected a terrorist cell after the August 13 incident.
And on June 17, two people were injured in another southern city when a woman shouting "Allahu akbar" (God's greatest) attacked them in a supermarket with a carving knife.
France has been on alert following a series of jihadist attacks in recent years, often by people who have radicalized themselves or claim to have acted on behalf of the IS group.
More than 240 people have been killed by Islamist extremists since the massacre of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris in January 2015.
kap-grd-nal-rfo / epe / dar / hh / kaf
The attack took place in the 19th arrondissement of Paris
