Course : ENGLISH A1 CLASS

Read the following text and answer the questions.

Christian Guibbert, a former police officer, was shopping in a Super U supermarket when he heard several shots. It was 8km away from Carcassonne in Trebes, a sleepy town of 5,000 people in southern France. At about 11:00 am, the attacker, a man of 25, walked into the shop shouting “Allahu Akbar” and claiming he was a soldier of the Islamic State. Around 50 people were inside the building. The attacker immediately opened fire, killing one supermarket worker and one customer.

The attacker, named as Radouane Lakdim, was born in Morocco and lived in Carcassonne. He had been on an intelligence watchlist since 2014. He had also been accused twice in 2011 and 2015 of minor crimes, including drug-dealing. During surveillance, security services had not seen signs that suggested Lakdim would commit an attack. The situation at the supermarket lasted just over three hours, during which the gunman had asked for the release of Salah Abdeslam, the only surviving member from the group that carried out the November 2015 Paris attacks. When members of the French police attempted to evacuate the supermarket they found out that Lakdim was holding several hostages. Lt Col Arnaud Beltrame, a police officer, volunteered to take the hostages’ place. He finally ended up seriously injured and died from his injuries a day later. However, the interior minister praised the officer’s heroism as he had saved others by exchanging himself with the hostages. The attacker was shot dead by the police. Abdeslam is kept in a French prison as the investigation into the Paris attacks continues.