We're wrapping up the blog now. Here's a round-up of what we know so far.

• A lone gunman brought bloodshed and mayhem to the eastern Belgian city of Liège today, killing three people in a frenzied attack during which he lobbed hand grenades and fired an assault rifle into crowds of shoppers and commuters.

• The man, named as 33-year-old Nordine Amrani, died after going on the rampage in the Place Saint Lambert, near the city's bus station, court and Christmas market. Two teenage boys aged 15 and 17 were killed on the spot, while a 75-year-old woman died of her injuries later. A two-year-old child was reported to be in a critical condition in a local hospital, and at least 75 people were injured.

• Police said it was not clear whether Amrani, who had served time in jail for offences involving guns and drugs, had killed himself or died accidentally. He had been due to appear for police questioning this afternoon. The prosecutor of Liège, Danièle Reynders, said he had brought the weapons in a ruck-sack from his home and walked alone to the square in the city centre.

• Willy Demeyer, the mayor of Liège, said the two teenage victims were school pupils who had just taken exams. Initial speculation that the attack was linked to an attempted jail-break and was carried out by three people was subsequently quashed.

The press conference has confirmed that there was a lone attacker, Nordine Amrani, who killed three and injured 75. He threw three hand grenades and guns which he had brought with him from his home in Liege.

The first victims were a 15-year-old boy and a 17-year-old, who died on the spot. Amrani then killed himself. A 75-year-old woman died later from her injuries.



Amrani was not known to have any mental health problems and had no links to terrorism.

The man who carried out the attack had been due to appear at the Palais de Justice today, according to an unconfirmed report by RTL.

Sudpresse, meanwhile, is reporting that one of the victims was a 15-year-old boy.

For the moment there are 64 injured people in six different hospitals throughout Liège and the surrounding region, according to Sudpresse.

Daniel Ransart of the Citadelle hospital has said that the majority of the 28 people brought to his institution were aged between 18 and 20 years old.





View Liege grenade attack v2 in a larger map

Here's a Google map locating today's attack. Note the Gare de Liège-Palais- the bus station.

While we wait for the press conference to begin, it is worth casting an eye over this piece on Open Briefing.org about the risks of journalists rushing to speculate in incidents such as this.

Written after the Norway shootings this summer, it comments:

In the absence of clear evidence of who the responsible individual or group might be, prejudice and inaccurate conjecture can be allowed to fill the space left vacant by fact – particularly on the rolling news channels, which stay with a story as it develops but often with very little other than opinion to report. This was acutely apparent in the media coverage in Britain and elsewhere in the hours following the attacks in Norway on 22 July 2011. Almost immediately a 'war on terror' narrative took hold, blaming the attacks on Muslim extremists. Security experts were pressed for their early conclusions as to who might be responsible, and almost all pointed the finger at Islamic terrorism.

The death toll from the attack has risen to four, including the attacker, according to police sources quoted in the local media.

The identities of the victims are not yet known, but a press conference is due to begin at 4pm local time during which a clearer picture should be formed.

Meanwhile the Belgian authorities have quashed speculation about any terrorist links with the Liege attack.

Sudpresse, the new site that was the first to name the alleged attacker as Nordine Amrani, is now reporting that his car was found by police on the place Saint Lambert.

In divided Belgium, Liege is the main francophone city of the smaller half, Wallonia, explains Ian Taynor.

Kris Peeters, prime minister of the Dutch-speaking bigger half, Flanders, has expressed his condolences and sympathy.

On behalf of the Flemish government I would like to express my deepest condolences for the innocent victims, their families and near ones. I hope this senseless act of violence will be punished swiftly.

The details of the attack remain unclear, with many differing reports still coming out.

The mayor of Liège, Willy Demeyer, has spoken to La Meuse newspaper after talks with the police, and has denied reports that three attackers were involved.

The attacker is understood to have acted alone; he had hand grenades and a kalachnikov. He shot into the crowd on the place Saint Lambert before being killed himself by a grenade. There was also another person killed. The attacker is known to the police, notably for drug offences.

A newspaper, Sudpresse, says it has had official confirmation that the dead attacker was named Nordine Amrani. This could not be independently confirmed. It writes:

Nordine Amrani is a resident of Liege aged 32 years old.

It says he was convicted in 2008 by the court of Liège to 58 months behind bars for the possession of weapons and for growing 2,800 cannabis plants as part of a criminal gang. None of this could be immediately confirmed.

Le Soir have slightly modified the latest toll: two dead, seven critically injured and 45 slightly injured are now the official figures.

The Belgian public broadcaster VRT is reporting that two or three assailants may still be at large, according to AP.



Police are telling residents to remain in their homes or seek shelter in shops or public buildings. Another broadcaster, Radio Television Belge Francophone, reported that all buses had been asked to leave the city center and all shops in the area were closed, some with many customers stranded inside. The report says police helicopters are flying over the city and a medical post has been set up in the courtyard of the palace of the Prince Bishops (court house) located on the site.

Speculation is mounting that the attack was linked to an attempted jail-break from the Palais de Justice, reports Ian Taynor.

The Palace of Justice complex on the St Lambert Square, the scene of the attack, is a large court and prison compound. Initial speculation that the assailants were involved in a jailbreak are hardening though it is unclear how they could be so heavily armed. The mayor of Liege, Willy Demeyer, confirmed that three males tried to escape from the palace of justice, according to the main Flemish paper, De Standaard.

Witnesses to the attack have been recounting the tragedy on Belgian radio, Ian Traynor says. Here are their testimonies.

Hervé Taverne said:

We were just coming out the [palais de] justice building [on the same square] and we saw someone throwing a hand grenade. It all happened so quickly that we ran for our lives. I grabbed a youngster inside, back into the building. Then after that various wounded were brought in. We heard gunshots outside. Meanwhile we've heard that there were several perpetrators, but we only saw one. We were also told that this was a [prison] escape action.

Dimitri Degryse drove past in his delivery van at the time of the attack.

I heard an explosion and I thought there was something wrong with my car. Then a second grenade went off; I saw smoke and heard several shots. People were lying bleeding on the ground. I stopped to help them. We tried to get the wounded off the street as quickly as possible.

Two people have died and 47 have been injured- seven of them critically- in the attack, Le Soir is quoting the prosecutor of Liège as saying.

The paper is now reporting that there were three attackers- one of whom shot himself dead during the attack and one of whom is believed to have taken refuge in the Palais de Justice. It does not report on the whereabouts of the other.

RTL has a slightly different version. It reports that one attacker killed himself, one was shot, and the third is still on the run and being "actively sought by the police".

Cedric Petit of Le Soir has posted this picture on Twitter, which he says shows one of the attackers being arrested.

At least one man can be seen lying on the ground in a shop entrance, but it is not clear what is happening.

Belgian police have said that one of the two dead is an assailant, while the other is a young man, reports the Guardian's Ian Traynor. The two-year-old mentioned earlier is critical, with breathing difficulties.

This video appears to show police evacuating the Place St Lambert towards the place de la République Française.

People are seen running and sirens are blaring.

The cordoned-off area on the place Saint Lambert is shown in this video, along with blood on the cobblestones.

Reader Stephen Whittaker, a former resident of Liege, has written in with some local knowledge of the area concerned. He writes:

The Place Saint-Lambert and Place de la Cathedrale are the two busiest squares in the city- at one end of Place Saint Lambert is the Xmas market, and the bus station is the main one for the entire province. I've had information from a friend working in the centre just now that they are all still being kept indoors.

My colleague Ian Traynor has filed this update from Brussels.



Police helicopters are in the skies over central Liege which is partly deserted following the attack. The Belgian news agency Belga quotes police sources saying two dead and up to 15 injured. There are said to have been three assailants lobbing grenades and firing from a Kalashnikov. One of them killed himself, one was captured and the other is on the run.

A second attacker has been arrested by the police, Le Soir reports. A third is still on the run, it adds.

They are reported- and caution, this all remains unconfirmed- to have used 'thunderflash' explosive devices, as well as a kalashnivkov.

A child of two years old is reported by Le Soir to be critically injured in the Saint Joseph hospital.

Details are still very confused. Le Soir, Belgium's biggest daily francophone paper, is reporting that the attack was carried out by at least two people- one of whom died in the explosions, one of whom fled.

He is understood to have hidden shortly after 1.30pm [local time] in a wing of Liège's new palais de justice.

Witnesses have reported that shots were still being heard about an hour after the attack took place.

Most news organisations appear to be reporting a death toll of two, according to a dispatch from AP.

Belgian media reported that one of the two dead was believed to be the assailant, a man believed to be about 40 years old. New reports said that at about 12:30 local time (6:30 a.m. EDT) the man lobbed several grenades at a bus shelter in Place Saint-Lambert, a busy downtown square. They said witnesses reported four explosions and gun fire. Phone calls to Liege authorities were not immediately answered. Belgium's VRT television network spoke with an unidentified man who was wounded in the attack and who said "someone threw grenades and fired shots." Police were on the scene quickly and sealed off the square. TV images showed blood splattered across the cobblestones. Valerie Schaaps, a spokeswoman for the prosecutors office, confirmed there had been explosions and gunfire, and that there were injuries. The daily La Meuse reported that the attacker had killed himself. Place Saint-Lambert is a busy crossroads: every day 1800 buses serve the square, which leads to downtown shopping streets.

The attack took place on the place Saint Lambert, which is located in the north of the centre of Liège, and, according to the news website 7-sur-7, consisted of four separate grenades being hurled, notably at a bus-stop.

The report, in French, says that one man is understood to have carried out the attack- but this remains unclear and unconfirmed. It adds:



One death is understood to have been confirmed- the person who carried out the attack is understood to have died. 10 injured have also been reported.

RTL-TVI, however, is reporting two deaths and ten injured.

At least one person has been killed and about a dozen others injured after a series of explosions in the Belgian city of Liège, according to media reports.

The circumstances of the blasts remain unclear, with some reports suggesting just one man was responsible for hurling grenades at the victims, and others saying several attackers were involved.

We'll be bringing you more when we have it.