84 killed, 100 injured as truck attacker plows into crowd in France

At least 84 people were killed while 100 sustained injuries after a truck driver ran into a crowd in the French city of Nice.

The lorry ran into the crowd celebrating the Bastille Day national holiday.

Witnesses said the truck was driven in a zig-zag pattern along the popular seaside Promenade des Anglais, around the time of the city’s celebratory fireworks.

A spokesperson for the interior ministry said the driver was shot dead by police after he reportedly opened fire.

Social media video showed people running through the streets in panic following the incident.

A journalist with the Nice Matin newspaper reported from the scene that there was “a lot of blood and without doubt many injured”.

Hours before the attack, President Francois Hollande had announced that the state of emergency declared as a result of the November attack, which left 89 people dead, would be lifted by the end of the month.

But in a pre-dawn press conference, the president said it would now be extended by a further three months.

“France is filled with sadness by this new tragedy,” he said. “There’s no denying the terrorist nature of this attack of yet again the most extreme form of violence.”

Bastille Day, or la fête nationale, is celebrated every July 14 in France. It marks the storming of the Bastille prison during the French Revolution in 1789.

Last November, gunmen stormed the Bataclan concert hall in Paris, killing 89 people. The co-ordinated attacks, which killed 130 people in total and injured more than 350 others, were carried out at different venues around the city.

Ten months earlier, two brothers stormed the offices of French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo, killing 12 people before another five were murdered in related attacks across the area.