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France Media Agency
The shooting took place just before 5 p.m. local time (9 p.m. GMT), at the crossroads of the 7e Avenue and 44e rue, a spokesperson told AFP. The three victims were hospitalized in a Manhattan hospital, their lives were not in danger, he added.
No arrests have yet been made, and police said the “investigation was still ongoing”, without giving further details.
A police press point was scheduled for the evening.
“Fortunately, these innocent bystanders are in stable condition,” tweeted Mayor Bill de Blasio. “The perpetrators of this violence are wanted and the police will bring them to justice. The flow of illegal weapons arriving in New York must stop, ”he added.
Times Square, one of New York’s tourist hotspots before the pandemic, has changed since theaters all closed in March 2020.
According to a recent report by the Times Square Alliance, the neighborhood business association, the area recorded 25 violent crimes in the first quarter of 2021, up from 17 in the same period of 2020.
At the end of March, the video recording of an assault on a sexagenarian of Asian origin in the neighborhood had deeply shocked. A man with a heavy judicial record, who lived in a hotel near Times Square that had become a reception center for the homeless, had been arrested and charged.
Neighborhood theaters are set to start reopening on September 14, however, and the mayor of New York recently announced a major campaign to revive tourism from June.
The shootings in New York have sharply increased since the summer of 2020 and the protests against the police violence that followed the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, sparking controversy over the causes and remedies for this increase, six weeks before the primaries for the municipal election.
According to the latest official statistics, New York recorded 149 shootings in April, against 56 in April 2020 (+ 166%). Crime in general was up 30% over the same period.
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