PARIS (SW): Explosion in a bar near a Paris stadium, a shootout outside three Paris restaurants and a hostage situation in a concert hall have left over 100 dead in the French Capital Friday night.
Seven out of estimated eight attackers have reportedly blown themselves up. Just before midnight local time, French President François Hollande declared a national state of emergency and ordered the borders closed.
According to the France 24 News, France has been on edge since deadly attacks by Islamic extremists in January on satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo and a kosher grocery that left 20 dead, including the three attackers. One of the restaurants targeted Friday, Le Carillon, is in the same general neighborhood as the Charlie Hebdo offices.
The country has seen several smaller-scale attacks or attempts since, including an incident on a high-speed train in August in which American travelers thwarted a heavily armed Islamic radical trying to attack passengers, it added.
French President François Hollande and Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve announced that a crisis cell had been set up. "The president of the Republic, the prime minister and the interior minister are in a inter-ministerial crisis cell," the government said in a statement.
US President Barack Obama called the Paris attacks an "outrageous attempt to terrorize civilians and said, "We will work with France to bring terrorists to justice."
According to the BBC, Paris residents have been asked to stay indoors and about 1,500 military personnel are being deployed across the city. The gunmen's motives were not immediately confirmed, but one witness at the Bataclan heard one of the attackers appear to express support for the militant Islamic State (IS) group, the BBC reported.
It added that what happened in Paris on Friday night is exactly what Europe's security services have long feared, and tried to foil. Simultaneous, rolling attacks, with automatic weapons and suicide bombers in the heart of a major European city, targeting multiple, crowded public locations.
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