Police in Paris shoot woman after she ‘threatened to blow herself up’ and allegedly made death threats on a train

Police shot a woman in Paris after she allegedly threatened to blow herself up and made death threats on a train.

Two police officers together fired eight shots, seriously injuring the woman, after stopping her at a train station, the Paris prosecutor’s office said.

It marks the latest security incident in France, which has been on heightened anti-terror alert since a fatal stabbing at a school on 13 October.

The woman was taken to hospital for emergency treatment.

A police investigation has been opened into the exact nature of what the woman allegedly said on the RER C suburban train, and witness testimony will be gathered, the prosecutor’s office added.

The woman is facing potential charges of making death threats, of defending terrorism and of intimidating behaviour directed at police, according to the Associated Press.

She was dressed in a long robe, known as an abaya, prosecutors said.

French government spokesman Olivier Veran said the woman “made remarks of a rather Islamist nature” that worried other passengers.

Police in Paris said officers responded after several train passengers phoned the emergency services and reported that a woman was making threats.

Officers waited for the suspect at a Metro and suburban train station in eastern Paris that serves the François Mitterrand national library.

Officers fired after she refused to obey police orders, the authorities said. The train station was then evacuated.

A search of the woman found she wasn’t carrying explosives, Paris police chief Laurent Nunez said.

Another police probe was opened into the shooting, which is automatic when officers use firearms.