14/11/2015 BBC Weekend News

Today at six, we are in the heart of Paris, a city in profound shock

after the worst terror attack in Europe for over a decade.

A wave of gun and bomb attacks across the city has left 130 dead,

Most of those killed were attending a rock concert.

As the extensive rescue operation got underway amid much confusion,

the government immediately imposed a national state of emergency.

I was under other people and they kept shooting.

One of the attacks happened at the State de France football stadium,

where France were playing and the President was in the crowd.

It's an act of war that was committed by a terrorist army,

There is a very strong police and military presence

on the streets of the city as the French try to comprehend

the second major terror attack this year.

France has started three days of national mourning as millions of

messages of sympathy and solidarity arrive from around the world.

We will have full details of the events of the past 24 hours, we will

have reaction here in France and from around the world and French

prosecutors are preparing, in the next few minutes, to share the

latest information they have about who they think might have been

responsible. after suffering the worst atrocity

Europe has seen for more than a The biggest attack on French soil

since the end of the Second World War. A wave of gun and bomb attacks

directed at bars and restaurants, a football stadium and a concert

hall. If you can see the neon yellow lights over there, just over my left

shoulder, that is the Bataclan concert hall, where most of the

people lost their lives last night, at least 80 of them. We think 130

people in total have died. There are hundreds injured and around 80

people who are acutely injured and in a state of absolute emergency,

according to the French medical services. President Holland

addressed the French nation on television today and said in his

view, it was a declaration of war by Islamic State -- Hollande. He

ordered three days of national mourning and a state of national

emergency. The shocking sequence of events started to unfold yesterday

evening in several areas. At 9.20pm local time, at the Stade

de France stadium where France were playing Germany, the first of three

suicide attacks took place. Then a few minutes later,

a gunman began shooting at a bar Shortly afterwards came another

attack on the Casa Nostra pizzeria. At 9.36,

18 people were killed by two gunmen The deadliest attack happened

at the Bataclan Theatre, where Four gunmen stormed the venue, where

a rock concert was taking place. And that is why so many people have

gathered here, near the Bataclan Theatre, where all of those people

were killed, and they are here to lay flowers, they have been gathered

here most of the day. It is chaotic, it is very noisy, but this

is where the people of Paris have decided to come this evening to show

their respect and show solidarity. We will be reporting back, the

nature of the reaction and of course the political reaction around the

world, which is responding to the enormity of what happened here in

Paris last night. Here's our Europe editor

Katya Adler. I should warn you there are some

distressing details in her report. This is how fun Friday night in

French capital for football fans, concertgoers and people enjoying a

quiet meal with friends exploded into a waking nightmare. It all

started just after 9pm. The chanting crowds here at the friendly between

France and Germany could have no clue here that this...

EXPLOSION was the sound of a suicide bomber.

Then a second, and then a third. Blowing themselves up outside the

stadium. The French president, who had been watching the match, was

ushered away. Dazed and Brighton fans lingered, too scared to venture

outside. -- frightened brands. They were right to be scared. This man

was near one of the bombers. His mobile phone stopped sharp shrapnel

from slicing into his skull. Others weren't so lucky. In the space of a

few hours, scores of people were killed in central Paris in a series

of co-ordinated attacks. This became a city of panic, as everyone

wondered where and who might be targeted next. Then suddenly, news

spread that the revellers at a rock concert here at the popular Bataclan

Theatre had been taken hostage. Some concertgoers managed to escape onto

the streets. They were shot at as they left. This mobile phone footage

shows their desperation. Almost too painful and powerful to watch. This

girl tries to escape the bloodshed inside by hanging outside the

window. The ordeal ended when French forces stormed the building. But

around 80 innocent people had already been killed.

TRANSLATION: We were piled upon each other. We heard the shots, people

screaming as though tortured. It was butchery, carnage.

TRANSLATION: I saw two young men, no older than 25, with Kalashnikovs.

They told us to lie down. There was one who kept gesturing for us to get

them. We all may then, the whole room lay down. I was under other

people and they kept shooting. Meanwhile, not far away, those

conmen's associates continue the killing spree in a number of Parisi

and restaurants -- gunman's. Murdered, while eating their evening

meal. On a normal Friday night, it is hard to find a hipper, happier,

more buzzing the pocket of Paris than these streets, filled with

young locals and tourists. The attackers did not target glitzy

Paris. With these shootings and the first suicide bombings on French

soil, they want to make everyone feel afraid and exposed. The former

owner of the liability the restaurant, where 18 people were

killed, told me he was devastated -- Bella keep. It is hell, he told me,

the people I sold this restaurant to were like family. Seven of them were

killed in the attack. In this neighbourhood, all of us like

family. It is devastating. Clearly shaken last night, today, the French

president was. TRANSLATION: It is an act of war. In

the case of war, the country needs to take the appropriate decisions.

An act of war that has been committed by a terrorist

organisation, IS, -- IS, a Jihadist Army. An act of war that has been

prepared from the outside and with accomplices on the inside which an

investigation will identify. French authorities have already identified

one of the attackers. A French national, they say, from just

outside Paris. France has declared a state of emergency, security is

tight. With extra troops in airports and along French borders and across

the country. People hardly dare whisper it, but there is real fear

on the streets here another planned attack could be just around the

corner. Catty Adler, BBC News, Paris.

As it was mentioned there, the biggest loss of life overnight was

at this concert hall, this theatre, in the south-eastern section of

Paris, not far from the Place de la Republique and not far from the

Bastille, and not so far away from the spot we were broadcasting from

back in January, when those dreadful attacks took place on the Charlie

Hebdo magazine, it is in the same part of the city. If you are just

joining us, it is that building over there with the very prominent yellow

lights on it, that is the Bataclan concert hall, where dozens of people

lost their lives last night when the gunman stormed in, they fired into

the crowd, there were scenes of absolute terror and panic, as we can

imagine, and then they calmly reloaded their weapons and carried

on firing. Lots of ambulances and police services still in this corner

today, which is why there are so many sirens going on. Lucy

Williamson has more details on what happened at the Bataclan Theatre

last night and again, some of the distressing images are in this

report. They struck France

when its guard was down. Their victims were vulnerable,

wrapped up in the music in the darkness

of Bataclan concert hall, dancing to

an American rock band, having fun. An hour into the concert,

she says the attackers stormed in shooting and she instinctively

fell to the floor. I got more or less buried under

a man who was shot in the head next to me and so I was underneath him

and from there, nobody moved, so then we heard some terrorists,

who were shouting, stay down, Inside the building,

hundreds of people were crammed Some of those closer to

the door managed to escape but Theresa was stuck too far away

and trying desperately to survive. One guy was badly hurt,

but really moaning and complaining and so we try to

say, shush, quiet, keep it, you know, your life, don't move,

because every time there was movement

somewhere, there was more gunshots. Outside, emergency vehicles

screaming through the empty streets began to hint

at the toll being extracted here. And then police weapons appeared

above her and Theresa escaped. I had a view to

the door where they came in and through that same door, then I

had a view of the police force, who slowly made their way in and people

were trying to make them signs, They said whoever can get up, crawl,

whatever, out, out, out. They emerged,

an eerie line up of survivors and behind them in the concert

hall, more than 80 people dead. With them,

the bodies of the four attackers. One witness told French media

there was a woman among them. What happened here on this

Paris Street will haunt France A target so ordinary,

seemingly so random, that singled out no specific group

or person, an attack that expressed Ten months after the attack

on Charlie Hebdo here, people are facing

a new threat to their freedom, as they absorb the implications of

a Friday night that changed France. Well, throughout the night and

today, the people of Paris have been really trying to show their support

and their solidarity for all of those affected by the attacks

overnight. Victims of the attacks who managed to escape, some of them

within seconds of losing their lives, and of course, the families

of those who suspect that some of their loved ones were caught up in

this and they might not see them again. Accommodation is being

offered, food is being offered, all types of support. When there was an

appeal for blood donors to come forward, there was such a response

that the blood donation in service factories -- service in Paris

couldn't cope, and indeed in other areas of France. That gives you an

idea of the overwhelming response and the crowd behind us, in this set

of streets, have all come here to lay flowers and show their respect.

Our correspondent debuted grammatical as reports on the

reaction of the people of the capital of France to what happened

here last night. -- Damien Grammaticus. In a city still

reeling, a nondescript place holds endless grief. This was the Paris

mortuary where survivors and families came surging today. Many

were told the identities of the dead confirmed until next week. It means

Paris's agony drags on. The city's hospitals took in three victims --

300 victims last night, and across the city, people are still

searching, still uncertain. I am looking for my sister-in-law, she

says. I have a list of hospitals but I don't know where she is. So the

faces of the missing are now being spread across the Internet. Every

image that of someone who has disappeared, posted by a relative if

anyone has seen them. There have been over 400,000 tweets spreading

the word. Elsewhere, Christians were reclaiming their streets, lining up

in their droves to donate blood, reasserting their humanity in the

face of horrors -- prescience. It is the only thing to do right now, he

says. I have never given blood before, but you cannot ask the

question, you just have to do it, you have to do anything you can to

help, it is the right thing to do. Look around, there are so many

people here. The brutality of what Paris

witnessed on a November night is seared into its consciousness. The

gunmen drove through and sprayed that restaurant with gunfire,

shooting around here. People were out there sitting on tables -- at

tables and they were shot at too. TRANSLATION: He was shaking and

there were three dead on the terrace. There was a girl wounded in

her wrist, she was taken to protect her inside and there was another

victim there. Julie was dining on the terrace of one of the

restaurants that was sprayed with bullets. She and her boyfriend

survived only because three minutes earlier they had argued, so she went

inside to pay the bill. TRANSLATION: We started to hear

shots. My reaction was to run but I couldn't see anyway out. For three

minutes there was shot after shot after shot. It just didn't stop. In

a city full of grief and loss, there are still stories to move people. A

little hope amid the carnage. I'm just going to give you the

latest figures we have, the French prosecutor has been speaking in the

last few minutes and these are the latest figures they are giving us.

129 people were confirmed dead. 352 people injured. And 99 of those very

seriously. 99 of them critically. 129 dead, 352 injured, 99 of them in

a state of absolute emergency, which is the phrase the medical services

here were using. Lots of them being treated of course in the city's

hospitals and one of them, the president has been visiting in the

past few minutes and Damian Grammaticas is there for us. Just a

sense of the theme of your report which was the overwhelming response

of the people of Paris? Yes, the president Francois Hollande was here

along with the Prime Minister. We saw them dried out about 15 minutes

ago in convoy. That visit was kept pretty low-key while they were in

there. This hospital alone, there are 40 of those very seriously ill

patients. The reaction across the city, the first thing to say is that

there are still many people, as you saw in that report, who do not know

what has happened to their loved ones. We saw people going to the

mortuary, coming out upset because they will not be told for several

days, that was the message, if there is not clear identification of the

victims. That is a very, very difficult process for some of the

families. Elsewhere, I have to say, going around the restaurants that

were targeted in the areas that were hit, it's very clear that the shock

is very deep. There were people we saw there who were saying to us that

they do not want to go out of their front doors, they don't want to go

out onto the streets. One man told me his 11-year-old daughter, she

walks down this street every day to go to her classes and now he is not

sure whether she should be doing that. That is the reality for people

living around these areas, the events that they saw and the scenes

that they witnessed outside at the restaurants on their doorsteps have

really shaken them to the core. Thank you for now. Our correspondent

at the Saint-Antoine hospital. The investigation clearly now is very

expensive. It is global in its nature, it has to be, given the fact

that people are already talking today about one of these gunmen

having an Egyptian passport. We're talking about Syrian links. There

have been reports in the past half hour or so about links to people who

have been living in Brussels, so the Belgian connection is certainly

being discussed as well. All of these things coming together but the

prosecutors so far understandably being rather cautious about offering

any theories, although we did hear the president speak very clearly

earlier, saying that this was, in his view, a declaration of war,

organised, he said, by Islamic State. He had no hesitation at all

in saying that. Our Security correspondent

Gordon Corera reports on the investigation into

the attackers and their motives. Paris is no stranger to the horrors

of terrorism, but this attack has shocked France, not just because

of its brutality and the death toll, but also the sophistication

of those who carried it out. Today this statement,

posted online from the group calling itself Islamic

State, said what it called "its Other IS supporters posted images

of weapons and a sign saying they were going to burn Paris,

although it's not clear if these France's former top counterterrorism

judge told me those involved were They are very professional,

quite professional. They knew not to use a rifle, a

Kalashnikov... The coordination is of the teams,

you know, represent some training Forensic teams

at the scene have been working to Fingerprints suggest one

of the individuals who attacked the concert was a Frenchman from a

Paris suburb, who was known to the A Syrian and Egyptian passport

were also linked to the suicide And Greek authorities are tonight

suggesting that the Syrian passport was registered with someone arriving

as a refugee in October. There were raids today

in a Belgian town, with reports that three of the eight attackers

may have been from the town. It was only

in January that the offices of the magazine Charlie Hebdo were hit,

while others struck a supermarket, but yesterday's attack was even

more complex, with more individuals involved, more sites struck

and the use of suicide vests. Details of the attackers are still

emerging here tonight, with reports that one may have been aged between

15 and 18. The signs are that some may have come into the country

recently, with talk of a self-contained cell back from Syria.

This strike by so-called Islamic State has rocked France, but the

real fear here tonight is that there may still be others out there

seeking to do the same. The latest from the French

prosecutor for you, 129 people confirmed dead and 352 injured, 99

of those very seriously injured. We are now being told too that the

French prosecutor thinks there were three teams of attackers here. We

have mentioned several locations of course, but they are saying that

they think there were three distinct teams doing what they were doing

last night, undertaking these atrocious attacks in several areas

of Paris. And of course you can imagine today, as the city reacts,

there is intense sensitivity in some quarters, not least among Muslim

leaders, because France's very big Muslim community, 5 million strong,

insisting and underlining all the while that they fully share the

French values of equality, liberty and fraternity and that they are

repulsed by all the acts they have seen this year, because of course

there was the attack back in January too. But there are concerns and one

community leader is saying today that he feared a tsunami of hatred

towards France's Muslim community after the events of the last 24

hours. Our Chief Correspondent Gavin Hewitt

has been speaking to people in Paris France has the largest Muslim

population in Europe. But in the past year, there have

been a series of attacks, like at the satirical magazine Charlie

Hebdo, carried out by extremists. Many of them grew up

in the vast estates on the anonymous Ten years ago,

I watched the angry suburbs rebel. It prompted new efforts

at integration, but always there The uncomfortable truth is that

there are today willing recruits for a more radical, violent Islamist

ideology, and Muslims today were Muslims in France are disgusted

by this. Do you think we

like being pointed at? Everywhere we go,

people give us a bad look. These days when we go for jobs,

they don't accept us. From conversations here,

it is clear that some young people do feel isolated

from French secular society and that some do have a sense of grievance

about French foreign policy, But people struggle to explain why

young men would come down here and just open fire

at people having a meal. Last night in this restaurant, this

Muslim man helped save the lives of After a spray of bullets I ran

and took the girls, who were But why any of this took place,

I've no idea. Earlier this year, President

Hollande and Europe's leaders linked But it has proved easy

for extremists to paint President Hollande's interventions

in the Middle East as part 2000 French Muslims are thought

to have joined the war in Syria. In France,

there are deep political divisions. The far right, led by Marine Le Pen,

continues to poll strongly. And already questions are being

asked whether any of the suspects travelled with

the recent groups of refugees. The fact is that France,

like other European countries, has not yet found a way to integrate

many of its young Muslims. Well, in London, David Cameron

chaired a meeting of the Cobra emergency Cabinet committee and said

that Britain should be bracing itself for news of British

casualties in the events of the past 24 hours here in Paris, and he went

on to confirm that the threat level in the UK remained at severe,

meaning that a terror attack is thought to be highly likely at the

very least. Our Security Correspondent Frank

Gardner reports on the UK's St Pancras Eurostar terminal

in London today, There were some tearful reunions

for those just back from Paris. Our hearts go out to the French

people and to all those who have lost loved ones. Today the British

and French people stand together, as we have done so often before in our

history, when confronted by evil. But Government ministers arriving

for today's Cobra emergency meeting in Whitehall want to know what more

can be done to stop There's no doubt that last

night was different. Some new tactics were employed

and of course a huge number of terrorists were attacking

at different sites. We're going to reflect on that

and make sure that our plans and That includes this all too realistic

exercise in London in the summer. It involves Scotland Yard's new

counterterrorism specialist firearms officers, training to tackle

multiple attacks by well-armed Ever since the

terrorist attacks on Mumbai in 2008, Scotland Yard specialist units

have been training intensively with the army and special forces to try

to cut down the amount of time it takes to bring an armed response

unit onto the streets to stop There was a genuine alert today

at Gatwick Airport, with North Terminal closed after

a man was arrested and a suspected The chances of such

a terrorist attack taking place in It is much harder to obtain the sort

of weaponry we have seen deployed in Really it's the machine guns that

meant that these individuals were able to murder quite so many people

in such a horrendous fashion. Monitoring that police exercise

in the summer gives only a hint of the challenges of a marauding

attack like the one in Paris. No one here is complacent about the

chances of it happening in Britain. The number of terrorism-related

arrests has been rising sharply. Our Chief Political Correspondent

John Pienaar is in Downing Street. On John, your sense of David

Cameron's response and what do you think the impact on the on the way

the British government is now thinking? We heard there that David

Cameron is at pains to express sympathy and solidarity with

Britain's nearest neighbour. We know that one Briton was among the many

dead in Paris. That figure could rise, not by many but enough to

bring this outrage closer to home. Tonight in Downing Street, the

French tricolour is flying alongside the union flag at half-mast, the

London eye is lit up in red, white and blue, like the Eiffel Tower and

solidarity is not merely symbolic. The intelligence agencies of the two

countries are working together. In policy terms, there are powers in

the pipeline for greater powers of surveillance to track and intercept

surveillance. -- data. Some may have doubts, but as far as Syria is

concerned, Downing Street have not been confident in putting it forward

to the House of Commons but in light of this, and public reaction, that

might change. John Pienaar, banks, his thoughts from Downing Street.

Experts that they have been pointing out that in recent months, so-called

Islamic State and their targets have been heavily focused in the Middle

East, not least in Syria and Iraq, but they have really been hit very

hard over recent months. There has been a lot of loss of life there,

which is, partly, they say, to explain why they might be responding

in this very violent and very angry and very daring way, coming right

into the heart of western Europe. For example, they have been

retaliating in the Middle East as well, in Lebanon on this week, 43

people were killed by suicide bombers there and demonstrating

really that IS is looking at new opportunities all the time to make a

very big and brutal statement. Quentin Somerville reports now on

the increasingly global impact of so-called Islamic State.

Kurdish forces taking back the town of Sinjar, and in Iraq,

the so-called Islamic State just got smaller.

They fled from here but not before they had torn the town apart.

We still don't know how many died under their year-long rule.

But it isn't the only place where they are in retreat.

In Syria, the Kurds and others - with US air power - have taken back

On its home ground, the Islamic State is faltering.

But further afield, it's bringing pain and terror.

In Beirut, they are burying their loved ones,

More than 40 people killed on a busy shopping street on Thursday.

It is one of the bloodiest attacks in years.

And in Egypt too, fresh tactics and fresh horror from Islamic State

bombers who may have brought down a Russian passenger plane.

Here in Iraq, the Islamic State behaves like an army,

it captures towns and villages and sends men onto the battlefield,

but in Sinjar and over the border in Syria, it has tasted defeat.

It is far from beaten, but the Islamic State is under pressure and

that may mean a shift in tactics and increasingly, the group will focus

its attacks outside of its home territory here in the Middle East.

The front lines in the fight against the Islamic State

Quentin Somerville, BBC News, Sinjar in northern Iraq.

Well, we were mentioning their that the French prosecutors have been

giving their latest information. Katya Adler joins us now, what can

you tell us about what they have been saying? What we have been

hearing, first of all, of course the French prosecutors are saying that

this investigation so far is barely a day old. They went through blow by

blow, through the events last night once again. What they can now

confirm is that the suicide bombers were all wearing the same type of

suicide belt that contained exactly the same type of explosives, design,

they said, to cause the maximum amount of death and damage. They all

had the same detonator as well. One of the hostage-takers from inside

the concert has has been identified as a young Frenchman, born in 1985,

and known to the French authorities, we now know. He had a petty criminal

record but never went to jail. He is known to have been radicalised back

in 2010 but was never known to the authorities to have ever been

involved in any kind of extremist activities. We then heard that next

to the body of one of the suicide bombers, a Syrian passport was

found. That Syrian passport belonged to a Syrian national born, we

heard, in 1990, so both very young men and again, he was not known to

the French authorities. We also heard of a Belgian link. There were

two black cars involved in the shooting attacks on the restaurants.

One of them has been linked to a Frenchman living in Belgium. The

Belgians have launched a variety of raids today, including finding this

man, who was carrying two other men in the car, trying to cross over

this morning from France into Belgium. As we heard, this is an

ongoing investigation in France and across the rest of Europe. Katya

Adler, there thank you. While she was giving us at analysis, I have

been joined by two Parisiens, who have come to say something about

their experience last night. Where were you last night? We were at

home, discussing the Syrian crisis. We have just come back from vacation

and we were supposed to be at the concert. Why won't you there?

Because we had a family obligation and we had to travel. What are your

thoughts today? HE SPEAKS FRENCH.

He is saying he really wants to be here just to show solidarity and

sympathy for the victims and that he really felt he needed to come

along. Anselmo coming your thoughts, when you see 70 people gathered

here, Paris again after the attacks in January, what do you think? We

have to resist. That is why we are here, we are here to show we are not

afraid. We resist my living normally. Life has to go on. Do you

agree? HE SPEAKS FRENCH.

So he is saying that really there is a big difference in his view between

what happened here today and what happened back in January, because,

really, this is proving that it can happen to anyone and given that

there were so many young people in the concert enjoying that concert,

it really does show that everyone is vulnerable. Just a final message, if

I may, did you know anyone who went to the concert last night? No, none

of our friends, that we are aware Rob, at least. We called everybody

last night, we try to reach out -- whereof. People were at the other

restaurant attack, but they are fine. We are thinking of you, thank

you very much for talking to us. Giving us their thoughts. Really

quite representative of people who are talking to us today, just

profoundly shaken by what has happened in the last 24 hours. Just

to underline, if you are just catching up with the news this

evening, the French prosecutor has confirmed 129 dead, 352 people

injured, 99 of them very seriously. We will have more for you on the BBC

News channel throughout the evening, there will be a special edition of

Newsnight at 8pm on BBC Two and I will be back at 10pm on BBC One with

the latest from the heart of Paris, but for now, I will leave you with

some of the very painful and searing images of the night that Paris came

under attack. TRANSLATION: I saw two young men, no

older than 25, with Kalashnikovs. They can do this again and again. We

will be here. THEY SING.