Attack type Vehicle-ramming attack Non-fatal injuries 11 Number of deaths 0 | Date 21 December 2014 | |
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Similar 2014 Nantes attack, Curtis Culwell Center att, 2015 Sana'a mosque b, 2014 Endeavour Hills stab, 2015 Thalys train attack | ||
On 21 December 2014, a man in the French city of Dijon was arrested after a Vehicle-ramming attack in which he drove a van into 11 pedestrians in five areas of the city in the space of half an hour. Two people were seriously injured.
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The perpetrator shouted the Islamic takbir Allahu Akbar ("God is Great") and had a long record of mental disorder and no known links with terrorist groups. According to the Globe and Mail the attack, and others were "apparently inspired by a video" circulated by ISIL calling on French Muslims to attack non-Muslims using vehicles.
Attack
In the space of half an hour, the attacker drove his van into groups of pedestrians in 5 separate areas of the city, and was heard to be shoulting Allahu Akbar
Suspect
The man arrested was reported to be "40-year-old man of Arab origin" and "Algerian and Moroccan descent." He had been known to the police for minor of offenses committed over the course of 20 years, and had repeatedly been treated for “serious and long-established psychiatric issues”. French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve described him as "very unstable". The local prosecutor said the incident was not linked to terrorism and the Interior Ministry believed that he had acted alone, although anti-terrorism investigators opened an inquiry into the attack.
According to the New York Times, "The driver is said to have become 'very agitated' at home after watching a television program about the plight of children in Chechnya. (The city prosecutor, Marie-Christine) Tarrare said he had told the police that the program made him want to attack the French state by running over police or military officers, but that, after driving to a police station, he chose to drive into pedestrians."
The question of whether the attack should be understood as motivated by radical Islamism was unclear. According to the BBC, "the official line" was that this attack was "not terrorism," however, "many people will be asking themselves if there is not some copycat effect being played out. Also, even if it is established the car attacks were the work of unbalanced individuals, might not Islamist propaganda have played some role in pushing them to the act?"
Although the motives of the attacker remain unclear, the attack has sometimes been described as one of a series of violent attacks on French soil.
Reactions
Manuel Valls, the Prime Minister of France, expressed his "solidarity" with the victims of the attack via Twitter.
The government deployed 300 troops onto French streets after a third attack in as many days, when a driver in Nantes injured 10 and killed one at the city's Christmas market the night after the Dijon attack.