Darmanin
© Thomas Coex, AFP/ArchivesFrench Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin. Paris will expel "dangerous" foreigners without waiting for ECHR approval, Gerald Darmanin has declared.
A police official was injured after being stabbed with a knife in Cannes, southern France, and his assailant has been "neutralised", said French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin on Monday.

The attack in Cannes comes as worries over violent crime and terrorism feature among voters' main concerns in the run-up to the 2022 French presidential election.

"I am going to the scene immediately this morning and I offer my support to the national police and to the city of Cannes," added Darmanin on his Twitter account.


The policeman was behind the wheel of a car in front of a police station at 6.30am when the attacker opened the door of the vehicle and stabbed him with a knife, a police source speaking on condition of anonymity told AFP.

The officer was saved thanks to his bullet-proof vest, sources said.

The attacker was severely injured by another police officer and was in serious condition. French media reports said the suspect is an Algerian national with an Italian residency permit. The suspect was born in 1984 and was unknown to French authorities, according to media reports.

The sources said police were treating the incident as a possible terrorist attack.

French police have been targeted in a series of attacks from Islamic extremists in recent years, leading to calls for better protection and harsher jail sentences.


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On April 23, a police administrative assistant was killed when an attacker stabbed her at the entrance to a police station in the Parisian suburb of Rambouillet. The attacker, a 36-year-old Tunisian national, was shot dead by security forces.

In October 2019, three officers and one police employee in Paris were stabbed to death in the headquarters of the Paris police by a radicalised IT employee.

Each attack has sharpened attention on the danger of Islamic extremism in France, which has suffered a wave of violence over the last decade from radicals inspired by al Qaeda or the Islamic State (IS) group.