At least one candidate in the forthcoming presidential election has refused to halt his campaign in the wake of the killing of four people outside a Jewish school in Toulouse on Monday, hinting that creeping xenophobia in France may have been responsible.
Francois Bayrou, of the centrist MoDem party, on Monday said that anti-foreigner sentiment had crept into the election debate and that certain parties “were pointing the finger at people because of their origins and fanning passions in order to gain political capital.”
Police have linked the gun used at the school to the killings of three French soldiers of North African origin in Toulouse and nearby Montauban the previous week, raising speculation that the murders were committed by the same person and that they were racially motivated.
A 24-year-old gunman, still holed up in his besieged Toulouse apartment, has admitted killing seven people in a recent spate of attacks in southwest France, according to Paris's top prosecutor. Follow events as they unfold on France24 live blog.