Supermarket Archives

Gunman shot dead after killing 2 in French supermarket

by admin | May 25, 2021 | World

Paris : A gunman was shot dead after killing at least two people in a hostage situation at a supermarket in a southern French town on Friday in what officials treated as “an act of terror”.

The incident unfolded in the morning at a Super U supermarket in Trebes town where the attacker opened fire and held several people hostage. Police stormed into the supermarket leading to a standoff that lasted about three hours, CNN reported.

Reports said the gunman, who pledged allegiance to the Islamic State terror group, killed two hostages before he was shot dead by the police. “The hostage-taker has been shot down,” Interior Minister Gérard Collomb said on his Twitter account.

Later in a press conference, Collomb identified the alleged assailant as a 26-year-old common criminal and small-time drug dealer.

Earlier in the day the same man had shot at a group of police officers in city of Carcassonne, injuring one.

The gunman, believed to be a Moroccan and reportedly known to French intelligence services, was said to be heavily armed and asked for the release of Salah Abdeslam, the key surviving suspect in the 2015 Paris attacks which killed 130 people.

French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said on Twitter that all information about the supermarket attack pointed to “an act of terror”. The Paris prosecutor’s office said it was opening an investigation into a “terrorist act”, as well as murder and attempted murder.

French President Emmanuel Macron, who was in Brussels at an EU leaders’ summit, described the hostage incident as a “terror attack” and said he would return to the country promptly.

“Everything leads us to believe that it is indeed a terror attack which is, as I said, still ongoing. The police … intervened in a very coordinated manner after what was first an attack against police officers,” Macron said at a press conference alongside German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

France has been hit with several deadly terror attacks since 2015 and has been on high alert since. A state of Emergency put in place after the 2015 attacks in Paris was lifted in October.

—IANS

French court rules halal supermarket to be closed down after refusing to sell pork, alcohol

by admin | May 25, 2021 | Halal Food, Halal Industries, World

Paris : The court of Nanterre in the western suburbs of Paris in France has ruled that a halal supermarket in the Colombes to be closed down and its rental lease to be canceled after it failed to heed warnings that it must “sell pork and alcohol products.”

The supermarket had come under fire last year in August by Nicole Goueta, mayor of Colombes and local authorities for “not catering to the general public.”

The matter was taken to court after the owner of the market objected accusations that it was “discriminatory” and not following the conditions on its lease which stipulated that the market must act as a “general food store.”

The court said that the market had not added alcohol and non-halal meats to its range of products and therefore went against its lease, and ruled its lease to be canceled while ordering the owner of the shop to pay 4,000 euros’ worth of court fees and empty the premises, Daily Sabah News reported.

The warnings to the market came after locals complained that they could no longer get a broad range of products at the now-halal market, which had replaced a regular supermarket and had to travel further to get the products they desired.

The market owner had told Le Parisien, a French daily newspaper, that he did not sell pork or alcohol because he took the supply-demand balance into account in the neighborhood. Many on social media had come to the owner’s rescue, saying there were many specialty shops across France which only sold specific products, and that authorities’ insistence was a “discriminatory” practice.

—SM/OIC-UNA