About an hour later, an Interior Ministry spokesman, Pierre-Henry Brandet, told reporters in Paris that the two attackers had entered the church — it was not immediately clear whether the Mass had ended — armed with weapons. “Were they knives, were they handguns, it’s much too early to say,” he said.
The Rouen unit of the B.R.I., a police team that specializes in major crimes like armed robberies and kidnappings, “arrived extremely quickly and positioned itself around the church.” The two hostage-takers left the church and were shot by the police, Mr. Brandet said. A police bomb squad searched the church to make sure it had not been booby-trapped. Counselors were sent to provide aid to three hostages who were rescued and who were not physically injured.
According to Father Moanda-Phuati, the parish priest, the church’s Tuesday Mass begins at 9 a.m. and lasts for about half an hour. Because of the summer holidays, attendance would have been low — fewer than 10 people, he estimated.
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