The killing of a teacher at a school in France was a terror attack, Emmanuel Macron has said.
The president added that police had helped thwart another attempted attack elsewhere in France today.
The knife attack occurred at the Gambetta secondary school in Arras, in the north of the country.
Two other people, including another teacher and a security guard, were seriously injured and were fighting for their lives.
“The teacher who was killed had come forward to protect others and had without doubt saved many lives,” said Mr Macron.
He said the attack was an act of “barbaric Islamist terrorism”.
The victim has been named by local media as Dominique Bernard, a French language teacher.
A suspect, believed to be a former student at the school, has been arrested.
His brother has also been detained, according to the country’s media.
The suspect is reported to be in his 20s, Russian-born and of Chechen origin, and on a watchlist of people known to be at risk of radicalisation.
He had under surveillance since the summer and was stopped as recently as Thursday for a police check which found no wrongdoing, the French intelligence services said.
A police officer, who was one of the first on the scene, said the suspect shouted “Allahu Akbar” – which means “God is great” in Arabic – before the stabbing.
Residents have been advised by local authorities to avoid the centre of the town, which is south of the city of Lille, following the attack.
Police operations are said to be “ongoing”.
Students were reportedly locked down in the school during the incident.
None of the children were physically harmed during the attack, according to reports.
‘We ran’
Local media quoted one pupil as saying: “We came out of class to go to the canteen, and we saw the guy with two knives attacking the teacher, who had blood on him.
“He tried to calm him down and protect us.
“He told us to get out, but we didn’t understand.
“We ran, and others went back upstairs.”
A security alert was triggered later at another school in Arras, a school worker told the Reuters news agency.
A third man was reportedly arrested in that incident, when he tried to enter the school with a suspicious rucksack.
In a post about the stabbing on X, formerly known as Twitter, French interior minister Gerald Darmanin wrote: “A police operation took place at the Gambetta high school in Arras.
“The perpetrator was arrested by the police.”
Education minister Gabriel Attal urged schools across France to “immediately take all measures” to increase security following the attack.
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Police at the scene
Naima Moutchou, a vice president of France’s National Assembly, expressed “solidarity and thoughts for the victims, their families and the educational community” on behalf of the assembly’s representatives.
