Day of national mourning declared

PRESIDENT Francois Hollande has declared Thursday, January 8, a day of national mourning in France in honour of those who died in today’s deadly gun attack on the Paris offices of satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo.

In a short live address to the nation, Mr Hollande said: “Today, France has been attacked at her heart.

“Talented artists are dead. Here, I want to say that we will continue to defend their message of freedom, in their names.

“Today they are our heroes. Tomorrow will be a day of national mourning.”

He said that a moment’s silence will be held at noon tomorrow, while flags on public buildings will fly at half-mast for three days, adding: “Our best weapon is our unity.”

And he said that the gunmen will be apprehended and dealt with “severely”.

“Liberty will always be stronger than barbarism. We will win because we have the capacity to believe in our destiny,” he said, before concluding: “Vive la République. Vive la France.”

Mr Hollande was speaking as more than 100,000 people took to the streets across France to honour the victims of the atrocity. An estimated 15,000 people gathered in Paris’s Place de la Republique, while crowds of 10,000 were reported in both Lyon and Toulouse, and other vigils were held in towns and cities across France, including in Nice and Rennes.

Mourners were joined by thousands more in cities around the world, including Trafalgar Square in London, and outside the French Embassies in Berlin and Copenhagen, Dublin, Edinburgh, Amsterdam, Brussels, Madrid, Rome, Vienna, Moscow, Tunis, Lima and Rio de Janeiro.

Many carried banners bearing the legend: Je Suis Charlie. Others held up pens as a symbol of press freedom, while journalists in the crowd waved their press cards in honour of their fallen comrades.

Online, a single black ribbon is being displayed on the French page of Google.

At the weekend, crowds at sporting events across the country will take part in a minute’s silence.

This morning, masked men armed with Kalashnikovs and a rocket-launcher opened fire in the Paris offices of the satirical magazine, killing at least 12 people, including two police officers.

Among the dead are the magazine’s editor and cartoonist, Stéphane Charbonnier, aka Charb, and his fellow cartoonists Cabu, Georges Wolinski and Bernard Verlhac, known as Tignous.

A fifth victim has been named in reports as economist and writer Bernard Maris.

Several more were injured in the attack, and four have been described as hovering “between life and death”.

Witnesses reported that the attackers shouted, “We have avenged the Prophet Muhammad,” as they fled the magazine’s offices in the 11th arrondissement of the city.

Photo: Screengrab / France TV Info