France attack: What do we know about the Annecy knife attacker?
Four young children are in hospital with life-threatening injuries after a knife attack in France earlier today.
Two adults were also injured when a man armed with a knife went into a playground full of children and started stabbing people in the southeastern town of Annecy in the French Alps.
One of the young victims was British. The two wounded adults are thought to be elderly men.
The man, who authorities say is originally from Syria, was detained by police. They say it is not being treated as a terrorist incident.
What do we know about the Annecy attacker?
The attacker is a Syrian national who was granted refugee status in Sweden 10 years ago and had entered France legally, French Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne told a press conference after travelling to Annecy.
He has been named as Abdalmasih H by French media.
He was found with Swedish identity documents and a Swedish driving licence, according to a police spokesman.
Earlier this month he had a demand for asylum in France rejected, French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said.
He also made asylum requests in Switzerland and Italy.
He is 31 and “has one child who is the same age as the children he attacked,” Ms Borne said.
The man is in his early 30s
According to French broadcaster BFMTV, he is married to a Swedish woman, but the couple separated eight months ago and his wife has not heard from him for half of that time.
They were studying together to be nurses, BFMTV report.
Ms Borne confirmed he was not known to the French security services, and has no criminal or psychiatric history.
Mr Darmanin said he had certain “Christian religious insignia” on him during the incident.
Police have said he had “no apparent terrorist motive”.
French authorities have said the man was a Syrian refugee
Who was injured in the Annecy attack?
Four children and two adults were injured, police have said.
All four children – including a young British girl – are fighting for their lives.
Two of the children, earlier reported as a brother and sister but who BFMTV report are cousins, are in a life-threatening condition in hospital. They are aged two and three.
The other young victims were a three-year-old British girl, BFMTV report, and a 22-month-old German boy. They are also being treated for life-threatening injuries in hospital, according to an update from a French prosecutor on Thursday afternoon.
One of the victims is Dutch, the local prosecutor added.
UK Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said officials are travelling to Annecy to assist the British victim’s family.
The two adult victims were both elderly men, one aged 78 and the other 70, BFMTV said. One of them is in a critical condition.
What do we know about the attack itself?
It happened in Le Paquier park, which is between the town centre and the northwestern corner of Lake Annecy.
Sky News international correspondent John Sparks says it “would be very busy at this time of year with tourists and residents out on the streets”.
Emergency vehicles gather at the scene. Pic: AP
Police section off the park in Annecy
Map
One witness, who gave his name as Ferdinand, told BFMTV: “He [the attacker] jumped [into the playground], started shouting and then went towards the strollers [prams], repeatedly hitting the little ones with a knife.”
Another witness who owns a restaurant nearby, George, said: “Mothers were crying, everybody was running.”
Yohan, who owns an ice cream parlour opposite the park, said: “It’s a place where babysitters and parents take young children to play. I often see around 15 toddlers there in the morning, and the atmosphere is fantastic.”
Another unnamed bystander told BFMTV he saw first aiders working on “little bodies, three or four years old, perhaps”.
This video appears to have been taken by a bystander after the attack.
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Latest video of Annecy knife attacker
You can hear what sounds like screaming people in the background.
Two members of the public with their rucksacks appear to try to stop the attacker or slow down his progress.
What have the president and politicians said?
Emmanuel Macron said it was an “absolutely cowardly attack in a park” and the “nation is in shock”.
In Paris, politicians interrupted a debate to hold a moment of silence for the victims, BFMTV reported.
The assembly president, Yael Braun-Pivet, said: “There are some very young children who are in critical condition and I invite you to respect a minute of silence for them, for their families, and so that, we hope, the consequences of this very grave attack do not lead to the nation grieving.”
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Foreign Secretary James Cleverly on Annecy attack
Speaking at an OECD press conference in Paris on Thursday afternoon, UK Foreign Secretary James Cleverly described it as a “terrible act of violence”.
“Of course, our thoughts are with the victims and the families and we stand ready to support the French authorities in whichever way we can,” he said.
Confirming the injured British child, he added: “We’ve already deployed British consulate officials who are travelling to the area to make themselves available to support the family.”
Both opposition leader Sir Keir Starmer and Home Secretary Suella Braverman have also offered their condolences.
Elon Musk could be on track for a $1trn pay packet.
Tesla shareholders have approved the whopping financial package for the CEO – who’s already worth an estimated $491bn – if he hits a series of ambitious targets over the next 10 years.
But that $1trn figure (or £761,910,000,000) – which is both one thousand billion and one million million – is almost impossible to imagine for most people.
Even so, we have drilled down into the numbers and examined what you can do with a trillion US dollars – and it turns out, quite a lot.
Show me the money
Laid end to end, a trillion one-dollar bills would cover a distance of approximately 156 billion metres.
That could wrap around the equator 3,890 times, easily reach the sun from Earth (around 149.6 million km) or loop from Earth to the moon 405 times.
That many one-dollar notes could cover a massive area (roughly 10,339 km squared), meaning you could blanket nearly all of Lebanon or Jamaica in bills.
Spend it on sport
You could splash out on virtually all of the world’s major sporting leagues.
The clubs which make up the Premier League are relatively cheap ($30bn), and even when snapping up the UEFA Champions League clubs and the big five top divisions of Spain, Italy, Germany, and France, there’s still $858bn left in the kitty.
The four major US sports leagues for ice hockey, baseball, basketball, and American football (NFL, NBA, MLB and NHL) have a rough valuation of $544bn, according to Sportico.
But then add the IPL cricket league ($120bn) and F1 ($23.1bn) and Musk still has change from an estimated total spend of $829.7bn.
Elon Musk is in the money if he hits targets set by Tesla’s shareholders. File pic: AP
Take over Tesla’s rivals
He could buy up the top 15 largest publicly traded automakers (excluding Tesla) by market capitalisation.
They would include firms like Japan’s Toyota ($275bn), Chinese automaker BYD ($120bn), and luxury brands like Ferrari ($81bn) and Mercedes-Benz ($62bn), as well as BMW ($52bn), Volkswagen ($50bn) and Ford ($48bn).
But there would still be a little change left over; the total bill would be an eye-watering $992bn.
Buy up San Diego
He could buy up every single residential property in San Diego County – valued at a total of $1trn. Seattle is just slightly out of reach at $1.1trn, according to recent data from real estate firm Zillow.
But if he wanted to buy big – there is always Tennessee. The total value of homes in the US state is estimated at $957bn. Or there is Maryland, which at $1.01trn could be bought if he can find a little more cash behind the sofa.
Sadly, he would struggle to scoop up London’s entire housing stock, which in February was valued at just under £2trn ($2.53trn), according to agents Savills.
Cities like New York ($4.6trn) and Los Angeles ($3.9trn) are also not within his budget, hosting America’s most expensive residential markets.
Do something charitable?
There is always the possibility Musk could follow in the footsteps of Microsoft founder Bill Gates, who intends to give away 99% of his vast fortune over the next 20 years.
He could give every single man, woman, and child in the US a share of his cash pile. They would receive approximately $2,917.32 (£2,223.29), based on a population estimate of 342.7 million.
Although it would be roughly $14,348.79 (£10,935.20) for every person (roughly 69.6 million) in the UK.
If he wanted to give the entire globe an early Christmas present, then based on the rough world population estimate of 8.2 billion, everyone would receive $121.80 (£92.87).
Pay off the credit card
With $1trn, he could instantly rewrite history and erase debt interest payments and the government debt from dozens of the world’s sovereign nations.
Or Musk could wipe out the debts of Singapore ($1trn) or South Korea ($0.99trn) in one go, according to figures from the International Monetary Fund’s latest World Economic Outlook (Oct 2025).
But when it comes to the biggest debt-laden countries, $1trn would not even touch the sides.
The US has $38.3trn of government debt (just over one third of the total global debt pile) while the UK has a modest $4.1trn.
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