Three women who were likely planning an “imminent and violent” attack were arrested Thursday near Paris, French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said.
Describing the women as radicalized, Cazeneuve said the three were arrested in connection with gas cylinders found this week inside a car left in front of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.
A police officer was injured in the shoulder when one woman attacked him with a knife in Boussy-Saint-Antoine, southeast of Paris, the minister told reporters. The injury was not life-threatening.
“I would like to express my gratitude to him and to his colleagues who had to open fire when faced with individuals armed with knives,” Cazeneuve said.
One of the women also was hurt.
The minister said the unidentified women are 19, 23 and 39. CNN affiliate BFMTV said the owner of the car reported two daughters as missing and they were arrested Thursday. It said the 19-year-old woman stabbed the officer and was injured.
French President Francois Hollande said Friday that authorities had information enabling them to foil the attack and thanked the security services for capturing the suspects.
BFMTV said a car with a half-dozen gas cylinders was found Sunday near Notre Dame. One cylinder was empty, and the other six were reportedly full. No detonator or firing device were found, and the vehicle was not reported as stolen.
France has been under a state of emergency since the Paris terror attacks in November, and authorities have struggled to monitor thousands of domestic radicals on their radar.
One of two suspects in a July church attack that left a priest dead in northern France was known to anti-terror authorities after attempting a trip to Syria, a French anti-terrorism prosecutor said.
The priest’s killing followed a string of violent attacks across Europe, some claimed by the Sunni terror group ISIS, including the Bastille Day attack in Nice.
