An armed driver who drove a vehicle into a police van on Paris's Champs-Elysees avenue "in an attempted attack" is dead, France's interior minister Gerard Collomb said.
The Paris prosecutor's counter-terrorism unit said it had opened an investigation into the incident, which occurred only a short walk away from the Elysees presidential palace and the U.S. embassy.
Police officials said the man was on police radar for ties to radicalism, and the prime minister confirmed that the man had a gun permit.
The man set off a fiery blast when he drove his vehicle packed with arms and explosives into police. The incident on one of the French capital's busiest shopping and tourist districts rattled the city anew after multiple attacks targeting security forces. The minister used the occasion to explain the continued need for a state of emergency, in place since 2015, and plans to extend it until November 1, to be presented at a Cabinet meeting Wednesday.
Noemie Pfister, walking with her infant child and a friend, said she saw a vehicle fly past a column of police vans, then fishtail.
A police spokeswoman says nobody else was hurt in the attempted attack.
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Police carry away the dead body of a man who rammed into a police convoy and detonated an explosive device on the Champs Elysees avenue in Paris in Paris, France, Monday, June 19, 2017. France's anti-terrorism prosecutor has opened an investigation. France is under a state of emergency after a string of deadly Islamic extremist attacks.
The latest attack came two days before the French government is to unveil a new anti-terrorism law, created to allow the state of emergency to be lifted.
The Associated Press reported the 31-year-old male driver from a suburb of Paris had been flagged by authorities for extremism.
Police searched on Monday night the residence the suspect shared with his family in Plessis-Pate, a town about 40 minutes' drive from central Paris.
At least one subway station in the area was closed. Authorities say they believe the crash was an intentional attack, and the vehicle driven by the assailant may have been packed with explosives.
"At this stage in the investigation, it is believed that the suspect acted alone but we are of course investigating all the circumstances leading up to the attack", the force said in a statement.
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