Driver ploughs into pedestrians in France

Eleven people have been injured, two seriously, after a man drove into pedestrians in Dijon in eastern France, while shouting "Allahu Akbar".

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The site on December 21, 2014 in Dijon where a driver shouting 'Allahu Akbar' ('God is great') ploughed into a crowd injuring 11 people, two seriously. (Getty)

A driver shouting "Allahu Akbar" ("God is great") has ploughed into pedestrians in eastern France, injuring 11 of them, just a day after a man yelling the same words was killed in an attack on police officers.

Two of the people injured in the car attack in the city of Dijon are in a serious condition, a police source said, adding that the driver had been arrested.

"The man, born in 1974, is apparently unbalanced and had been in a psychiatric hospital," a source close to the investigation told AFP, adding that "for now his motives are still unclear".

The man had targeted groups of passers by at five different locations in the city on Sunday evening in a rampage that lasted around half-an-hour, the police source said.

"Nine people were lightly injured and two others seriously but their lives do not appear to be in danger," the source added.

Witnesses told police that the driver shouted "Allahu Akbar" and "that he was acting for the children of Palestine", a source close to the investigation said.

Police sources said the driver was known to police for petty offences dating back to the 1990s.

On a street in the city centre traces of blood and attempts by authorities to cover it up with sand could be seen, AFP journalists there said. Nearby, victims and their families were being cared for at a hospital.

France is still reeling from a suspected radical Islamic attack on Saturday that saw a French convert to Islam shot dead after attacking police officers with a knife while also reportedly crying "Allahu Akbar" in the central town of Joue-les-Tours.

The assailant, Burundi-born French national, Bertrand Nzohabonayo seriously injured two officers - slashing one in the face - and hurting another.

The weekend incidents come as governments around the world brace for so-called "lone wolf" attacks by individuals returning from waging jihad abroad, or who are simply following Islamic State group calls for violence in the countries involved in a coalition fighting the militants in Iraq and Syria.


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