Pictured: Three victims of ‘far-right racist’ gunman in Paris

Three Kurdish refugees have been identified as the victims of a gun attack allegedly carried out by a ‘far-Right racist fanatic’ in Paris.

As prime suspect William M., 69, remained in prison in the French capital following Friday’s bloodbath, the names of the deceased were released.

They include Emine Kara, the leader of the Kurdish women’s movement in France, who was refused asylum in the country earlier this year.

This infuriated Kurdish nationalists, who accused the French authorities of not doing enough to protect her.

Pictured: Emine Kara, the leader of the Kurdish women’s movement in France, who was refused asylum in the country earlier this year, was identified as one of the victims

Pictured: Abdullah Kizil, a dissident, was one of the dead identified from the massacre

Pictured: Mir Perwer, a popular Kurdish singer exiled in France, was also gunned down

Footage purporting to show the alleged gunman making his way into a nearby barber shop is now circulating online.

Mir Perwer, a popular Kurdish singer exiled in France, was also gunned down, as was Abdullah Kizil, another dissident.

All of the victims were identified by the European Kurdish Democratic Societies Congress, based in Belgium.

A spokesman described them as ‘those who fell as martyrs in the attack on the Kurdish Cultural Centre in Paris’. 

Rioting broke out after William M. – a retired train driver aged 69 – went on the rampage in the 10th arrondissement on Friday morning just days after being bailed from prison where he was awaiting trial for allegedly trying to murder two Sudanese refugees.

This time he was said to be targeting the Kurdish community, and after he murdered three and severely wounded three others, Kurds were involved in disturbances in the area.

‘Large crowds of Kurds gathered in the hours after the shooting, and turned their anger on the police,’ said an investigating source.

‘When Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin arrived at the scene, hundreds of protesters started throwing whatever they could find at officers, while lighting fires.

‘The riot police responded with baton charges and tear gas, making for very ugly scenes.’

Graphic pictures from the area surrounding the Ahmet-Kaya Kurdish Cultural Centre show officers dragging their colleagues from the riots as protesters collapse and tear gas fills the air.

Earlier in the day, William M. arrived in the area ‘armed with a gun and deliberately targeted an area full of immigrants, including recent arrivals sleeping rough,’ said the investigating source.

‘He threatened people in a hairdresser, a restaurant, and people close to the Ahmet-Kaya Kurdish cultural centre. He seemed intent on killing as many people as he could.’

Five police are among the injured in Paris this evening after demonstrators set fire to the streets in response to the tragic deaths of three Kurds, who were massacred by a ‘racist’ gunman in the heart of the city

Police held protective shields as fire and smoke billowed from the streets of Paris

 Police dragged their colleague away from the scene on Friday 

Footage purporting to show the alleged gunman making his way into a nearby barber shop is now circulating online.

In the vision the man, wearing an outfit which matches that of reports describing the gunman, limps into the store, clutching what appears to be a handgun.

The footage appears to show the alleged gunman shooting again multiple times in the direction of customers and staff.

Patrons were already in hiding by the time the man entered the store, cowering just beyond the eyeline of the camera.

But a skirmish appears to take place in the far left corner, and the man is detained.

Some customers appear to flee while other men begin making calls and await the arrival of authorities. Local media reports one of the men seen fleeing was shot in the foot, but escaped with his life.

The video has reportedly been taken from the barber’s own CCTV camera.

MailOnline verified the footage by comparing the interior of the hair salon with other video posted online of the moment the suspect was arrested.

Furious Kurds have clashed with police at the site of the shooting as senior politicians blame the attack on racism

Pictures from outside the salon showed the suspect in the same khaki coloured shirt, dark trousers and light sneakers, being dragged away by police officers.

Some seven shots were heard close to noon, as people fled in panic from an area close to the Eurostar railway hub at the Gare du Nord.

Three victims died from their wounds, before police arrived and injured the killer in the face, before he was overpowered and arrested inside a hairdresser.

Witnesses said they heard William M. shouting: ‘I hate Kurds’.

In 2013, three women Kurdish activists, including Sakine Cansiz, a founder of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, were shot dead at a nearby Kurdish centre in Paris.

A Turkish citizen was charged with killing them, and suspicion fell on the Turkish intelligence services.

William M. was described by the investigating source as a ‘far-Right racist fanatic’ who had just been released from prison where he was on remand following an attack on two Sudanese refugees with a sabre.

It was a year ago – on December, 8 2021 – that the man went on the rampage in a refugee camp in Paris.

A man is helped by fellow protestors as the French police use tear gas and riot gear to control furious crowds near the site of the shooting

Pictured: A woman nurses another protester who collapsed during violent clashes on Friday evenin

‘He used a sabre to slice two men, and damage six tents at a camp in the Bercy park in the 12th arrondissement of Paris,’ said the investigating source.

‘He was wounded when one of the refugees was disarming him. Two Sudanese refugees were badly wounded in the attack.’

The man was put on remand in prison, while awaiting trial for attempted murder linked to racism, but he was bailed on December 12.

Restrictions included having his French passport removed, and he was also banned from keeping any kind of weapon, while under ‘judicial supervision’.

William M. – who is solely being referred to by his first name and surname initial for legal reasons – was also convicted for ‘violent behaviour’ in 2016.

Despite this, he got hold of a gun before launching his attack on Friday – one that Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau said was being ‘examined for racist motivations’.

Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said the man ‘was clearly targeting foreigners’, but that it was ‘not certain’ he had aimed to kill ‘Kurds in particular’.

He was also a member of a shooting sports club ‘and has several registered weapons’, Darmanin said.

The bloodshed sparked pandemonium in the streets as demonstrators clashed with police

Emotional protesters, mainly from the Kurdish local community, clashed with police on Friday

Officers deployed outside the cultural centre used teargas to disperse the protesters who tried to break through a police cordon protecting Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin, who had arrived at the scene

Key questions for French authorities in the coming days include why the suspect was out on parole, with left-wing opponents already accusing President Macron’s government of failing to take far-right threats seriously enough.

‘The far-right appears to have struck again. With deadly consequences,’ senior hard-left MP Clementine Autain wrote on Twitter. ‘When will those at the head of the state start taking this terror threat seriously?’

Beccuau stressed, however, that ‘nothing enables us to establish at this stage that this man belongs to an ideologically extreme group’.

The suspect’s elderly parents, aged 91 and 93, were quoted in local media discussing his ‘crazy, idiotic’ behavior.

His father said he had been living with them in the 2nd arrondissement since his release from prison.

Just hours before the attack, on Thursday night, he was playing Scrabble with his mother. Neighbours described him as ‘strange’ to the same publication.

Investigators securing the street identify gun casings on the street near upturned pot plants

Police secure the street after several shots were fired along rue d’Enghien in the 10th arrondissement

The shooting took place not far from Gare du Nord station near a Kurdish cultural centre and a hairdresser’

A member of the Kurdish community kneels on the ground as he is detained during clashes with the police in Paris, near the site of a shooting earlier today

Often described as the world’s largest people without a state, the Kurds are a Muslim but non-Arab ethnic group spread across Syria, Iraq and Iran, which has faced persecution and violence.

The Kurdish Democratic Council of France (CDK-F), an umbrella group for Kurds in France which uses the cultural centre as its headquarters, said in a statement it considered the shooting to be a ‘terror attack’.

Abdulkarim Omar, the representative of the Kurdish-led autonomous administration in northeast Syria to Europe, condemned the attack as a ‘cowardly terrorist act’.

Paris housing official Ian Brossat said the attack carried out by William M. last year was related to the anti-migrant rhetoric of far-Right politicians such as Eric Zemmour, who was a presidential candidate at the time.

‘The attack came three days after a meeting by Eric Zemmour,’ said Mr Brossat. ‘This is the result of an unprecedented trivialization of racist remarks. When words of this nature are repeated morning, noon and evening, they end up giving rise to violent acts like those which occurred this morning in Bercy.

‘It is time to take seriously the threat posed by this trivialization of racism throughout the country.’

French President Emmanuel Macron said in a tweet, ‘The Kurds of France have been the target of a heinous attack in the heart of Paris. Our thoughts are with the victims, the people who are struggling to live, their families and loved ones.

‘Recognition to our law enforcement for their courage and composure.’ 

It follows a series of shooting and stabbings in Paris dating back to 2015, all of them linked to Islamist terrorism.

The deadliest single terrorist attack ever in city came in November 2015 when 130 people were killed by suicide bombers pledging allegiance to ISIS around the Stade de France, cafes, restaurants and the Bataclan music venue, where 90 died.

Earlier in the year, two Paris-born gunmen linked to Al-Qaeda broke into the offices of the Charlie Hebdo satirical magazine, leaving 17 people dead inside and three outside.

There have also been frequent knife attacks on the forces of law and order, leading to the deaths of serving police.

Officers deployed outside the cultural centre used teargas to disperse the protesters who tried to break through a police cordon protecting Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin, who had arrived at the scene

Paris police said they were dealing with an incident on the Rue d’Enghien and urged the public to stay away from the area

Prosecutors have opened an investigation into murder, intentional homicide and aggravated violence

Some demonstrators were chanting in support of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, an organisation designated as terrorist by Ankara, the European Union and others