The knife-wielding suspect, identified by prosecutors as a 37-year-old Algerian-born man, was arrested at the site of Saturday’s attack in the eastern city of Mulhouse.
A further three people were in custody in connection with the case Sunday, the PNAT prosecutors unit said, without giving details.
Speaking at the police station late Saturday, Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau said the man had “a schizophrenic profile” and his act had “a psychiatric dimension”.
The rampage occurred around 4 pm (1500 GMT) near a busy market in Mulhouse, a city of around 110,000 people near the German border. At the time, demonstrators were rallying in support of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Two officers were seriously wounded, with one sustaining an injury to a carotid artery, and the other to the upper body, prosecutor Heitz told AFP, adding that the latter officer was able to leave hospital.
During the attack, the suspect was heard shouting “Allahu Akbar” (God is greatest), according to the national anti-terror prosecutors unit (PNAT).
Macron later said there was “no doubt” that the incident was “a terrorist act”, specifically “an Islamist terrorist act”.
Speaking during a visit to France’s agriculture fair Saturday, Macron offered condolences to the family of the victim and said the “solidarity of the nation” was behind them.
Failed expulsions
It was launched in 2015 following deadly attacks on satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo’s offices and on a Jewish supermarket.
“Once again, it is Islamist terrorism that has struck,“ he said. And, once again, he added, problems of migration were “at the origin of this terrorist act”.
Prime Minister Francois Bayrou said that “fanaticism has struck again, and we are in mourning”.
France’s foreign minister Jean-Noel Barrot said there would be a meeting of the government’s immigration control council on Wednesday to discuss the implications of the case.
France has recently experienced a string of stabbings deemed acts of terror.
In December 2023, a man suspected of stabbing a German tourist to death near the Eiffel Tower was charged with carrying out a terror attack.
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