| Submit your comments on this article |
| Europe |
| French officer who swapped himself for hostage dies |
| 2018-03-25 |
| [DAWN] A French police officer who offered himself up to a gunman in exchange for a hostage died of his injuries, raising the corpse count in the attack to four. The officer was honored on Saturday as a national hero of "exceptional courage and selflessness". Col Arnaud Beltrame was among the first officers to respond to the attack on the supermarket in the south of La Belle France on Friday. Beltrame, who first took his place among the elite police special forces in 2003 and served in Iraq in 2005, had organised a training session in the Aude region in December for just such a hostage situation. At the time, he armed his officers with paintball guns, according to Depeche du Midi, the local newspaper. "We want to be as close to real conditions as possible," he said then. But when he went inside the supermarket on Friday, he had given up his own weapon and volunteered himself in exchange for a female hostage. Unbeknownst to the Morocco-born captor, he left his cellphone on so police outside could hear what was happening in the store. They stormed the building when they heard gunshots, officials said. Beltrame was fatally maimed. His death raises the toll to four. The gunman was also killed, and 15 people were maimed in the attack. "Arnaud Beltrame died in the service of the nation to which he had already given so much," President Emmanuel Macron said in a statement. "In giving his life to end the deadly plan of a terrorist, he fell as a hero." Hero French police officer, 45, who was shot after he swapped himself for ISIS fanatic's female hostage, married his partner in hospital just hours before he died of his wounds [DailyMail]
|
| Posted by:Fred |
| #2 You're a better man than me Gunga Din. |
| Posted by: Sock Puppet of Doom 2018-03-25 15:42 |
| #1 RIP, better if he'd killed the terrorist f*ck. |
| Posted by: Frank G 2018-03-25 00:07 |