well we're joined by catherine norris
trent a reporter
for france 24 catherine thanks very much
for joining us here on bbc
news uh tell us what the authorities are
saying
the authorities are treating this as a
terrorist attack
the wheels have been put in motion
legally
and this is being looked into by
investigators for the anti-terror unit
here in france
we've also heard from the mayor of nice
christian
escuzzi who has equally called this a
terrorist attack and has called for all
places of worship in the city of east to
be
closed now we know france is heading
into a new national lockdown but we can
imagine that restrictions are going to
be
even tighter in nice following this um
president emmanuel macron
has been attending an emergency meeting
which was initially due to discuss the
new
coronavirus lockdown which comes into
place in france at
midnight uh thursday midnight tonight
but that the subject of that meeting has
been switched to this
new terror attack we also understand
that the president will be heading down
to nice later on today so clearly the
government here has an awful lot in his
hands but tensions have been running
pretty high in france
ever since a teacher was beheaded in
france a few weeks ago and the alert now
clearly very high
still yes we're just hearing that uh the
the president
emmanuel macron is in the interior
ministry at the moment in paris where
those crisis talks
are underway the mayor of news catherine
was very
quick to say that this was a terror
attack wasn't he
he was indeed and you have to understand
that this mayor is
someone who's very well known in france
on the right wing of the political
spectrum who's been very critical of the
government's anti-terror strategy and
wants the government to take a very firm
hand on this
having said that from the elements that
we know so far
this is what he is basing his statements
on he says that the attack
took place within the church uh reports
say that one woman the vessel when he
was killed
had her throat cut that she was beheaded
uh also that two other people
confirmed dead as well the mayor of nisa
said that the attackers
god is great in arabic so these are the
elements that he is reporting basing it
on
and of course we have seen recent terror
attacks in france since the satirical
uh newspaper charlie republished
cartoons of the prophet muhammad which
has started
a great deal of tensions and again was
cited as an attacker a few weeks ago as
the motive
for killing the school teacher of samuel
patty
outside of paris after he showed those
cartoons to his class in a civics lesson
we're told that the suspected attacker
in this
incident in nice has been shot and is
now
detained how clear is it whether this
person was acting alone
we don't know uh officers are saying
they are possibly
looking into the possibility that the
attacker had accomplices it's very early
stages at the moment
we know that police say they neutralize
the attacker but that doesn't mean at
this stage that he's been killed we
believe he's been injured and has been
transported to hospital he's clearly
no longer a threat he's under arrest
he's in control of the authorities
that they're going to be looking into
the network that this attacker
had and what contacts he'd had with
people leading up to this
attack in nice and they are leaving open
the possibility at the moment that there
was more than one attacker
but they say the principal suspect has
been
disarmed he's been shot and wounded and
has been taken to hospital
with the police and we understand that
other people were injured in addition to
the three people who died
what more do you know about that at the
moment
we just know that there were several
people who were injured in addition to
the three people
we're going to have to look and see
those casualty figures as we go through
the day again very early days
um but the attack we understand took
place inside the church so you can
imagine there were a number of people
inside the church at this stage
especially given that
france was heading is heading into a
national lockdown
say perhaps people inside the church
they're worshiping ahead of that
we don't know the numbers involved at
this stage but no doubt authorities will
be giving an update on that
how visible is the security presence in
nice
ordinarily nice does have a high
security presence because it has
been the scene of previous attacks
remember the attacks on bastille day a
few years ago
when many people were killed out on the
promenade when a man drove through
the crowd there killing them um so that
clearly raised the alert in the city
they've also been other attacks with
knives against police so
france has been under a pretty high
terror watch
generally since 2015 when there were uh
very
various deadly attacks on the charlie
hebdo newspaper
uh of course and then in november 2015
the very deadly attacks in paris on the
bataclan and
bars and cafes in the capital since then
it's been under
an alert vigilance for terror attacks
and in nice
as well because it has been the scene of
previous attacks we're just looking at
um the interior ministry
in paris at the moment live pictures
from the french capital which is where
emmanuel macron and his uh ministers
are holding crisis talks but since uh
uh samuel petty's death catherine there
has been a reassertion of the right to
freedom
of expression by by people from all
political persuasions hasn't that
yes this is a really big issue in france
at the moment
um there's a reassertion as you say of
france's
secular values so under france's rules
it's a laws it's a republic
and it's secular as public spaces by law
must
remain religious religion free um
french people also have under law the
right to blaspheme so
it is something of a core french value
to be able to express yourself
and to be able to say things while they
might be offensive to other religions
and this of course have been reasserted
recently with the killing of the teacher
samuel patty
who showed his civics class those
cartoons published by the charlie hebdon
newspaper and it's become a major public
debate and we've seen it spiral
internationally as well with several
countries in the islamic world
condemning remarks by president emmanuel
macron when he was paying homage to
senor patty
saying that france would not renounce
showing these caricatures it's become a
real
cultural flash point and has very much
been on the top of the agenda here
as well as causes foreign violence
catherine we're very grateful for you uh
talking to us here on bbc news thank you
very much catherine norris trent
a reporter for france 24.