Emmanuel Macron Visits Knife Attack Victims in Annecy Hospital

In the aftermath of the knife attack which left six injured Thursday in Annecy, including four young children, the political class goes to the bedside of the victims. Thus, Emmanuel and Brigitte Macron went to the University Hospital of Grenoble (Isère). The Head of State and his wife want to be alongside “the victims and their families as well as all the people who in Annecy have contributed to bringing them help and support”, indicated the Elysée.

The news “is positive” concerning the state of health of the children injured in the Annecy knife attack, said Emmanuel Macron. “Everything that was told to me is going in the right direction,” added the head of state, questioned by a firefighter during a visit to the prefecture of Annecy. “They are stabilized,” insisted the president.

He notably mentioned the case of a young Briton, “awakened”: “she watches television, and it is already a bad memory”. “And so the doctors were very confident,” he added, while saying he was “cautious”. Regarding “the little Dutch girl, who is (treated) in Geneva, it is better”, further detailed Mr. Macron. As for the most seriously injured adult, “he is also awake”, detailed the head of state.

The attack injured six people, including four young children. Two of the four children injured by a Syrian refugee armed with a knife in a playground in Annecy were in “vital emergency” as was an adult who was hospitalized after being injured by the attacker and then hit by gunfire. police during the arrest, and another adult was hit more lightly.

Investigation underway for “attempted assassination”

The motivations of the aggressor, a Syrian refugee born in 1991, remain obscure at this stage, in any case “without apparent terrorist motive”, according to the Annecy prosecutor’s office, which does not exclude a “senseless gesture”. When he took action, he was not under the influence of narcotics or alcohol, according to prosecutor Line Bonnet-Mathis. The ongoing investigation for “attempted murder” will “determine the motive” of the attacker, she said Thursday.

Abdalmasih H., who spent the night in police custody, was due to undergo a psychiatric examination this Friday morning, according to Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin. With no criminal record and no fixed address, this 31-year-old man who lived for ten years in Sweden had left his family a few months ago to go to France and had been in Annecy since the fall of 2022.

The attacker had obtained asylum in Sweden in 2013. “He could not obtain Swedish citizenship, so he decided to leave the country. We separated because I didn’t want to leave Sweden, ”said his ex-wife, joined by AFP.

Avalanche of reactions

This father of a three-year-old child was in a legal situation when he arrived in France. In a new asylum application filed in France in November 2022, he declared himself “Christian of Syria”, according to a police source. And he was wearing a Christian cross when he was arrested. According to Gérald Darmanin, the French authorities notified him last Sunday, June 4, that he could not obtain asylum in France since he already had it in Sweden.

The attack sparked an avalanche of reactions in the political world, with right-wing and far-right elected officials highlighting the origin and status of the aggressor. Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne and Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin already traveled to Annecy on Thursday, a city in shock after the attack in broad daylight in a busy park by the lake.