France confirms police killing “appalling terrorist act”

French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said on Tuesday that the killing, which took place on Monday of a police commander and his partner at their home by a man who had been convicted of jihadist terrorism, is an “appalling terrorist act”.

In a brief statement to the press after attending a crisis meeting at the Elysee Palace with French President Francois Hollande, Prime Minister Manuel Valls, and Justice Minister JeanJacques Urvoas, Cazeneuve confirmed that the murdered man was a senior police officer and the woman was an official in a police station.

The French official stressed that the government has been on high alert for months to face any threat, which it has previously acknowledged to be high in France, in Europe, and in the West, in reference to the attack on an Orlando night club early on Sunday.

Cazeneuve pointed out that since early this year “more than 100 individuals” have been arrested on suspicion of terrorism.

The attacker, Larossi Abballa, according to Le Monde, was sentenced in 2013, along with seven other individuals, to three years in prison for being involved in a network dedicated to sending jihadists to Pakistan.