Orly Airport

Orly airport: Attacker phoned father to say 'I screwed up'

Ziyed Ben Belgacem, 39, was killed after he put a gun to a soldier's head saying he wanted to "die for Allah".

Earlier on Saturday, he was involved in a shooting and then a carjacking.

His father told French radio Belgacem had phoned after the first attack to say he had "screwed up with a gendarme", before proceeding to Orly.

Belgacem is described as having been radicalised in prison, and was on a police watch-list.

His criminal record included convictions for armed robbery and drugs offences, Paris prosecutor Francois Molins told reporters late on Saturday.

Man shot dead at Orly Airport for attempting to take soldier's gun

No-one else in the busy terminal was hurt, but thousands of travellers were evacuated and flights were diverted to the city's other airport, Charles de Gaulle.

A French official connected to the investigation confirmed French media reports that identified the attacker as Ziyed Ben Belgacem, born in France in 1978.

The Paris prosecutors' office said he did not appear in a French government database of people considered potential threats to national security but that he had already crossed authorities' radar for suspected Islamic extremism.