Suspect ‘prayed’ before stabbing French soldier

Reports in the French media on Monday raised the likelihood that the stabbing of a uniformed French soldier in Paris on Saturday could have been inspired by last week’s murder of British soldier Lee Rigby in London.

Sources close to the police investigation told French daily newspaper Le Parisien that the suspect, who has still not been found since fleeing the scene of the attack at at the shopping and transport hub La Défense, was seen “praying” in the train station, before stabbing the soldier in the neck.

The suspected knife wielder was captured on CCTV cameras before, during and after the attack, said the source.

He is described as being a bearded, athletically-built man, 1.90 metres tall, who wore a black pullover, and not a djellaba (a traditional north-African robe) as was first reported in the press.

The 23-year-old soldier Cédric Cordier was stabbed in the neck from behind, by a man wielding what initial reports identified as a box-cutter, but was later confirmed to be a knife.

Stabbing ‘very close to lethal’

Mr Cordier’s partner, Amélie, told RTL radio on Sunday that the stab wound had come terrifyingly close to being lethal.

“It was just two centimetres away from his carotid artery,” she said.

Mr Cordier was released from hospital on Monday morning.

Meanwhile, French president François Hollande told reporters accompanying him on a trip to Ethiopia: “We still do not know the exact circumstances of the attack or the identity of the attacker, but we are looking at all options.”

“I do not think that at this stage a link can be made” to the Woolwich attack, he said.

French interior minister Manuel Valls, however, said there were similarities, and that the knife attack, which left Cordier “traumatised” but stable, “could have been a terrorist act.”

Terrorist act?

“Basically, there are components which could lead you to think we’re dealing with an act of terrorism,” Valls told France 5 TV on Sunday.

On Saturday Mr Valls also said that the “sudden violence of the attack” in Paris was one of a few elements that suggested “there was a form of comparison to be made with what happened in London.

However the minister said that the inquiry had “just begun,” and urged caution against “any lumping together or comparison” with the attack in Woolwich which saw Lee Rigby killed on a London street by two men wielding knives and a cleaver who then launched into a tirade against British military involvement in Muslim countries.

Defence Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian visited the wounded man in hospital and later told reporters he had been targeted because he was a soldier.

Mr Le Drian, who said the soldier was in a stable condition, vowed to continue France’s “implacable” fight against terrorism.

The soldier, who was armed and in uniform, was patrolling as part of France’s Vigipirate anti-terrorist alert system that sees troops deployed at high-profile tourist, business and transport sites across the capital.

The Vigipirate scheme was raised to “reinforced red” in January after jihadist rebels in Mali threatened to “strike at the heart of France.”

On “red alert” before Saturday’s attack at La Défense, authorities announced on Monday that they would not be raising Vigipirate to the highest level which is “crimson”.