A hostage situation in the northern French town of Roubaix ended with all the hostages released safely but one hostage-taker being killed.
The situation began on Tuesday evening, with local media reporting that a family had been held hostage in the town, which is near the Belgian border.
Senior police officials, due to the high alert levels in Belgium and France, were quick to point out that the situation was not related to terrorism.
The incident is reported to have been a robbery gone wrong when a group of armed with Kalashnikovs stormed the manager’s house in the northern town of Roubaix and tried to force him to open the bank’s safe, local prosecutor Frederic Fevre was quoted as saying.
The manager ran out of the house when police arrived, so the attackers took his wife, the couple’s daughter and their 1-year-old baby captive, Fevre said. One of the assailants fired on the officers, who fired back. A police tactical unit raided the home about two hours later.
The officers freed the hostages, shot one of the gunmen dead and captured one of them in a garden behind the home
It comes as the whole of France remains in a state of heightened alert following the November 13 attacks in Paris in which 130 people died.
Image: Police take up position near the scene of a shootout in Roubaix, northern France. Local authorities said the situation was not related to recent deadly attacks in Paris. Photograph: Pascal Rossignol/Reuters
