French prosecutors on Monday, June 2, were probing a terror motive after a man who had posted racist videos shot dead his Tunisian neighbor and badly wounded a Turkish citizen in the south of the country. The shooting late Saturday in Puget-sur-Argens in the Var region comes after a Malian man was stabbed to death in April in a mosque, also in southern France, as concern grows over hate crimes against Muslims.
The shooting was initially investigated by regional prosecutors as a suspected murder motivated by the victim's ethnicity or religion. But French national anti-terror prosecutors (PNAT) announced Monday that they would be taking over the investigation.
The suspected killer, a 53-year-old who is French, fled the scene in a car but was arrested not far away after his partner alerted police. He posted videos with racist content before and after the shooting late on Saturday, according to regional prosecutor Pierre Couttenier.
The Tunisian man killed, believed to be 35 years old, was shot five times. The Turkish citizen, 25, was wounded in the hand and hospitalized, the prosecutor said. A sports shooting enthusiast, the suspect "posted two videos on his social media account containing racist and hateful content before and after his attack," he added.
The PNAT prosecutors said Monday that they had opened an investigation into a "terrorist plot" motivated by the race or religion of the victims. "The racist nature of this double crime is beyond doubt, given the hateful remarks made by the killer," said SOS Racisme, an anti-discrimination NGO. "This tragedy echoes a series of racist crimes that have occurred in recent months," it said, denouncing a "poisonous climate" in the country including the "trivialization of racist rhetoric".
Aboubakar Cissé of Mali was stabbed dozens of times while attending prayers at the mosque in the southern French town of La Grand-Combe on April 25. A French national of Bosnian origin accused of carrying out the attack surrendered to Italian authorities after three days on the run. Italy then extradited him to France to face justice.
Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau was bitterly criticized for never traveling to the scene of that crime to show solidarity, while PNAT anti-terror prosecutors also came under fire for not taking over the case and instead leaving it to regular criminal prosecutors.