Newspaper had earlier posted a picture of Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi on its Twitter account

US counter-terror officials said earlier one suspect was killed and two others in custody, but this was not confirmed

Militants believed to be from Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula which was behind plane bomb plots in US and UK

shrugged off threats, saying: 'I'd rather die standing than live kneeling'


Two brothers and a teenager were last night revealed as the three suspects linked to a deadly terrorist attack on an anti-Islamist newspaper in France.

Said Kouachi, 34, and Cherif Kouachi, 32, both from Paris, were identified along with Hamyd Mourad, 18, from the north-eastern city of Reims.

Anti-terrorism officers hunting the terrorists issued photographs of the two brothers describing them as 'armed and dangerous'.

It came as a French official close to the case said Mourad had surrendered to police 'after seeing his name on social media' and was arrested at an undisclosed location.

It appeared last night that the hunt for the other men had turned to the Croix Rouge region of Reims, some two hours by car from Paris.

Dozens of members from France’s elite anti-terror unit surrounded an apartment building and there were reports a flat had been searched.

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Suspects: The three men were named as Cherif Kouachi (left), 32, his brother Said Kouachi (right), 34, and Hamyd Mourad, 18, of Gennevilliers

Response: Police are seen during an operation in the Croix-Rouge suburb of Reims, northern France, early this morning following the attacks

A raid by France’s elite anti-terrorist unit was underway late yesterday in Reims as part of the hunt for the gunmen who attacked the newspaper

Either the suspects will be able to escape, or ‘there will be a showdown’, said a member of the unit, urging reporters at the scene to be ‘vigilant'

Police officers stand guard outside a building in Reims while forensics look for evidence relating to the three suspects of the Paris attack

Forensic police officers look for evidence relating to the three suspects in an apartment located in the Croix Rouge neigborhood in Reims

Live television pictures showed police Swat teams holding positions around the building, with onlookers taking photographs.

Either the suspects will be able to escape, or ‘there will be a showdown’, said a member of the unit, urging journalists at the scene to remain ‘vigilant’.

Some 100,000 people gathered across France last night to back the publication, Charlie Hebdo, as a huge manhunt was launched to find the attackers.

The suspected Al Qaeda militants massacred 12 people in Paris yesterday, and among those slaughtered was a police officer as he begged for mercy.

One of the dead officers was named yesterday as Ahmed Merabet, who is believed to have been a Muslim.

Last night, thousands of people went to Republique Square near the scene to honour the victims, holding signs reading 'Je suis Charlie' - 'I am Charlie'.

The three suspects were last night said by Metronews to be all French citizens - with Mourad reported to be homeless.

'Massacre': The gunmen are seen brandishing Kalashnikovs as they move in on the injured police officer from their vehicle outside the office

Gunned down in cold blood: Horrific footage shows the injured police officer slumped on the pavement as two of the gunmen approach. In a desperate plea for his life, the officer slowly raises his hand towards one of the attackers, who callously shoots him at point-blank range

Brutal execution: A police officer pleads for mercy on the pavement in Paris before being shot in the head by masked gunmen during an attack on the headquarters of the French satirical publication Charlie Hebdo, a notoriously anti-Islamic publication

Running away: Gunmen shoot dead a wounded police officer on the ground at point-blank range as they flee the offices of Charlie Hebdo

Vigil: People gather around candles and pens at the Place de la Republique in Paris in support of the victims after the terrorist attack

There were disputed claims that the three men had been arrested 100 miles away in Reims, following a report by Libération. This could not be verified.

Cherif Kouachi was convicted in 2008 of terrorism charges for helping funnel fighters to Iraq's insurgency and sentenced to 18 months in prison.

Two senior US counter-terrorism officials told NBC News that one suspect was killed and the others in custody - but this could also not be confirmed.

A government official told Reuters there had been no arrests, and it appeared early this morning that police were still hunting for the three men.

Clad all in black with hoods and speaking French, the militants forced one of the cartoonists - at the office with her young daughter - to open the door.

Witnesses said the gunmen shouted 'we are from the Al Qaeda in Yemen', and 'Allahu akbar!' - Arabic for 'God is great' - as they stalked the building.

They were also said to have yelled 'the Prophet has been avenged', during what was France's deadliest post-war terrorist attack.

The attackers headed straight for the paper's editor and cartoonist, Stephane Charbonnier, killing him and his police bodyguard.

People gather in Toulouse last night to show their solidarity for the victims of the attack by gunmen on the offices of the satirical publication

Elsewhere: People gather at the Place Royale in Nantes to show their solidarity for the victims of the attack on the offices of the satirical weekly

Standing together: People hold up pens and posters reading 'I am Charlie' in French as they take part in a vigil in Trafalgar Square, London

People gather near candles lit to commemorate the victims of the deadly attack on the Charlie Hebdo offices, in Lyon, central France

'Not afraid': People gather to pay their respects for the victims of the terror attack against the satirical newspaper, in Paris last night

The security had been recruited to protect him after extremists firebombed the offices in 2011 over a satirical cartoon about the Prophet Mohammed.

A year later, Mr Charbonnier famously dismissed threats against his life, declaring: 'I would rather die standing than live kneeling.'

The militants also killed three other renowned cartoonists – men who had regularly satirised Islam – and the newspaper's deputy chief editor.

Despite a shoot-out with armed officers, the gunmen escaped in a hijacked car and remained on the loose yesterday evening.

This left the French capital in virtual lockdown as police and soldiers flooded the streets to join the search.

President Barack Obama offered US help in pursuing the gunmen, saying they had attacked freedom of expression.

But it also emerged that the White House had previously criticised Charlie Hebdo in 2012 over its Prophet Mohammed cartoon.

At the time it had said that the images would be 'deeply offensive to many and have the potential to be inflammatory'.

Emergency: Police officers and firefighters gather in front of the offices of Charlie Hebdo in Paris yesterday after gunmen stormed the building

Critical: Firefighters carry an injured man on a stretcher in front of the offices of French satirical paper Charlie Hebdo after the shooting

Faces of the victims: Among the journalists killed were (l to r) Charlie Hebdo's deputy chief editor Bernard Maris and cartoonists Georges Wolinski, Jean Cabut, aka Cabu, Stephane Charbonnier, who is also editor-in-chief, and Bernard Verlhac, also known as Tignous

Meanwhile, horrific footage emerged showing an injured police officer slumped on the pavement as two gunmen approached him outside the office.

In an apparent desperate plea for life, the officer is seen slowly raising his hand towards an attacker, who shoots him in the head at point-blank range.

Despite a fierce firefight with police, the men got away in a hijacked car, and, within an hour of the atrocity, appeared to have vanished without trace.

France raised its security alert to the highest level and reinforced protective measures at houses of worship, stores, media offices and transportation.

President Francois Hollande called the bloodbath a 'barbaric attack against France and against journalists' and vowed to hunt down those responsible.

Jacques Myard, French MP with opposition party UMP (Union for a Popular Movement), said: 'We knew something would happen.

'The (security) services used to say to us it's not if but when and where. We know that we are at war.

'The Western nations - like Britain, France, Germany - we are at war.'

The Queen yesterday sent her 'sincere condolences to the families of those who have been killed' in the attack.

And Prime Minister David Cameron described the murders as 'sickening'.

Last night: French forensic experts and police officers examine evidence outside the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo's office, in Paris

At large: The gunmen are seen near the offices of the French newspaper Charlie Hebdo before fleeing in a car. They remain on the loose

Forensic experts examine the car believed to have been used as the escape vehicle by gunmen who attacked the Charlie Hebdo office

Twitter users responded to the Charlie Hebdo massacre with an outpouring of solidarity using the hashtag #jesuischarlie, which is trending online.

By 4.15pm, nearly five hours after the attack, it had already been tweeted more than 250,000 times, according to one social analytics website.

Guy Verhofstadt, the President of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe tweeted: 'A tragic day for the freedom of speech #jesuischarlie.'

Marches have also been organised through Paris and London in support of journalistic freedom.

As well as the AK47 assault rifles, there were also reports of a rocket-propelled grenade being used in the attack.

It took place during the publication's weekly editorial meeting at around 12pm (11am GMT), meaning all the journalists would have been present.

A young mother and cartoonist, known as 'Coco', who survived the massacre told how she had let the suspected Al Qaeda killers into the office.

Corrine Rey said she had returned from picking up her daughter from a nursery when she was confronted by two armed men wearing balaclavas.

'I had gone to pick up my daughter at day care, arriving in front of the building, where two masked and armed men brutally threatened us,' said Ms Rey.

'They said they wanted to go up to the offices, so I tapped in the code,' said Ms Rey, referring to the digi-code security system on the interphone.

A police photographer (partially hidden) works with investigators as they examine the impacts from machine gun fire on a police vehicle

Life-threatening: An injured person is evacuated outside the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo's office

Ms Rey and her daughter hid under a desk, from where they saw two other cartoonists being executed.

'They shot Wolinski and Cabu,' she said. 'It lasted five minutes. I had taken refuge under a desk.'

Ms Rey said the men 'spoke French perfectly' and 'claimed they were 'Al Qaeda terrorists'.

Gunmen reportedly told another witness: 'You say to the media, it was Al Qaeda in Yemen.'

A police source told the Liberation newspaper the gunmen were asking for the Mr Charbonnier by name, shouting: 'Where is Charb? Where is Charb?'

The source added: 'They killed him then sprayed everyone else.'

Mr Charbonnier was included in a 2013 'Wanted Dead or Alive for Crimes Against Islam' article published by Al Qaeda propaganda magazine Inspire.

The latest tweet published by the newspaper's official Twitter account earlier in the day featured a cartoon of Abu Baghdadi, the leader of Islamic State.

In it, he wishes everyone 'good health'. Cartoonists Cabu, Tignous and Wolinski were all also reported dead.

Radio France chief executive Mathieu Gilet later announced on Twitter that a contributor, Bernard Maris, was another of the victims.

Shell-shocked: A woman cries outside the office. Witnesses reported hearing loud gunfire and at least one explosion during the attack

Trail of destruction: Police inspect the damage after a collision between police cars at the scene during a firefight with Islamic militants

Meanwhile, there were reports of a car explosion outside a synagogue in Sarcelles, in northern Paris, just hours after the Charlie Hebdo attack.

The blast, at about 1.30pm GMT, is not thought to be connected to the massacre, according to Paris Metro which quoted the mayor of Sarcelles.

Florence Pouvil, a saleswoman at Lunas France on Rue Nicolas Appert, opposite the Charlie Hebdo offices, spoke of her shock at the attack.

She told MailOnline: 'I saw two people with big guns, like Kalashnikovs outside our office and then we heard firing. We were very confused.

'There were two guys who came out of the building and shot everywhere. We hid on the floor, we were terrified.

'They came from the building opposite with big guns. It has a bunch of different companies inside.

'Some of our co-workers work there so we were frightened for them. They weren't just firing inside the Charlie Hebdo offices.

'They were firing in the street too. We feared for our lives so we hid under our desks so they wouldn't see us.

'Both men were dressed in black from head to toe and their faces were covered so I didn't see them.

'They were wearing military clothes, it wasn't common clothing, like they were soldiers.'

ARE PARIS GUNMEN FROM YEMENI AL QAEDA CELL BEHIND PLANE BOMB PLOTS IN THE U.S. AND BRITAIN? The gunmen being hunted by police over the Charlie Hebdo attack are believed to be from militant group Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). The group was established by Yusef al-Ayeri in 2003 in Saudi Arabia, but was forced to flee to Yemen after a series of attacks drove them back. Yemen's weak government allowed the group to rally and gain members, though they are only thought to have around 400 troops today. While their attacks initially focused on targets in the Middle East, such as an attempted suicide attack on Saudi Minister Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, they quickly spread to Western targets. On Christmas Day in 2009, they were implicated in the underwear bomb plot after Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was discovered on a Detroit-bound plane trying to detonate liquid explosives in his underpants. The following year AQAP also took responsibility for a plot to blow up two devices hidden inside printer cartridges loaded on to cargo planes travelling from Yemen to the United States. One device was discovered during a stopover at East Midlands Airport in Britain, while another was uncovered in Dubai. According to Stanford University the group is currently lead by Yemen-born Nasser al-Wuhayshi, who is an apprentice of Osama Bin Laden and was imprisoned for a time in Yemen, but escaped in 2006 along with 22 others. The group has a global jihadist agenda. Like ISIS, they aim to create a single Arab caliphate, covering Pakistan Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen and the Levant - the area encompassing Lebanon, Jordan, Syria and Israel. If yesterday's attack is confirmed as coming from AQAP, it will be the first time the group has used lone-wolf style tactics, in which gunmen act alone or in small groups to attack targets. Advertisement

Benoit Bringer, a journalist with Agence Premiere Ligne, told the iTele network he saw several masked men armed with machine guns

Carnage: A police official, Luc Poignant, said he was aware of one journalist dead and several injured, including three police officers

The New York Times reported that a journalist at the Charlie Hebdo office, who asked not to be named, texted a friend after the attack to say: 'I'm alive.

'There is death all around me. Yes, I am there. The jihadists spared me.'

Another witness, Gilles Boulanger, who works in the same building, told Itele: 'A neighbour called to warn me that there were armed men in the building and that we had to shut all the doors.

'And several minutes later, there were several shots heard in the building from automatic weapons firing in all directions.

'So then we looked out of the window and saw the shooting was on Boulevard Richard-Lenoir, with the police. It was really upsetting. You'd think it was a war zone.'

French journalist, Stefan De Vries, told Sky News: 'There was protection at the door but they killed the police officers, they executed them and they started shooting in the offices.'

An unnamed eyewitness told the BBC World Service: 'When I arrived at the scene it was quite disturbing as you can imagine. There were several corpses on the floor.

'We saw the number of casualties was very high, so we just tried to help as we could - there were a lot of people down on the floor and there was blood everywhere.

'I'm very traumatised by this attack and everything and now we're in psychological hell where we're being attended to by professionals.'

Terror: In footage filmed from a rooftop, people are seen running for cover as the gunmen rampage through the building

A picture posted on Twitter appearing to show people taking refuge on the roof of the Charlie Hebdo office

Benoit Bringer, a journalist at the scene who works next door, took refuge on the roof of the building, which is in the 11th arrondissement of Paris.

He said: 'There were very many people in the building. We evacuated via the roof just next to the office. After around ten minutes we saw two heavily armed, masked men in the street'.

Another witness said: 'There was a loud gunfire and at least one explosion. When police arrived there was a mass shoot-out. The men got away by car, stealing a car.'

A police official, Luc Poignant, said: 'It's carnage.'

After the shooting, hundreds of comments were posted on the Charlie Hebdo Twitter page, with one user, David Rault, writing: 'A sad day for freedom of expression.'

Charlie Hebdo's editor-in-chief Gerard Biard escaped the massacre because he was in London.

He told France Inter: 'I am shocked that people can have attacked a newspaper in France, a secular republic. I don't understand it.

'I don't understand how people can attack a newspaper with heavy weapons. A newspaper is not a weapon of war.'

Targeted: A picture posted on Twitter reportedly showing bullets in one of the windows of the Charlie Hebdo offices

High alert: French soldiers patrol at the Eiffel Tower after the Charlie Hebdo shooting as the militants are hunted across the city

French soldiers disembark at Le Bourget Airport, north of Paris, as part of a deployment of soldiers to enhance security in Paris last night

Mr Biard said he did not believe the attack was linked to the newspaper's latest front page, which featured novelist Michel Houellebecq, who has previously sparked controversy with comments about Islam.

And he said the newspaper had not received threats of violence: 'Not to my knowledge, and I don't think anyone had received them as individuals, because they would have talked about it. There was no particular tension at the moment.'

A visibly shocked French President François Hollande, speaking live near the scene of the shooting, said: 'France is today in shock, in front of a terrorist attack.

'This newspaper was threatened several rimes in the past and we need to show we are a united country.

'We have to be firm, and we have to be stand strong with the international community in the coming days and weeks.

'We are at a very difficult moment following several terrorist attacks. We are threated because we are a country of freedom

'We will punish the attackers. We will look for the people responsible.'

Yesterday, Mr Cameron said: 'We stand with the French people in the fight against terror and defending the freedom of the press.'

US President Barack Obama has condemned the 'horrific shooting', offering to provide any assistance needed 'to help bring these terrorists to justice'.

And United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said: 'It was a horrendous, unjustifiable and cold-blooded crime.

'It was also a direct assault on a cornerstone of democracy, on the media and on freedom of expression.'

The British Foreign Office immediately updated is advice for travellers heading to Pairs, warning: 'There is a high threat from terrorism.'

Defiant: Stephane Charbonnier, known by his pen name Charb, was editor of Charlie Hebdo, and gunned down by men with assault weapons

Mr Charbonnier was named as one of nine men the extreme Islamist group were targetting (pictured centre right). Their photographs were printed alongside the caption 'a bullet a day keeps the infidel away'

Tragic: Cartoonist Georges Wolinski was named by officials as one of those shot dead at the offices of Charlie Hebdo

Lead cartoonist Jean 'Cabu' Cabut (left) was among the 12 massacred by terrorists in Paris, along with Bernard 'Tignous' Verlhac (right)

Radio France chief executive Mathieu Gilet announced on Twitter that a contributor, Bernard Maris (above right) was another of the victims

It added: 'If you're in Paris or the Ile de France area take extra care and follow advice of French authorities.'

Luce Lapin and Laurent Leger, who have both worked at Charlie Hebdo, were using Twitter hours before the attack, with the most recent tweet posted by Lapin praising cartoonist Cabu.

It read: 'Cabu, a great man! And honest, he doesn't eat foie gras.'

While Leger's made a political point about taxes.

It said: 'Macron [French ministry of economy] wants more billionaires in France, the same that use tricks for not paying ISF [solidarity tax on wealth].'

Mohammed Moussaoui, president of the Union of French mosques, condemned the 'hateful act,' and urged Muslims and Christians 'to intensify their actions to give more strength to this dialogue to make a united front against extremism'.

It is believed to be the deadliest attack in France since 1961, when right-wingers who wanted to keep Algeria French bombed a train, killing 28 people.

The number of attackers was initially reported to be two, but the French Interior Minister later said security services were hunting three 'criminals'.

Bernard Cazeneuve added that Paris had been placed on the highest alert.

Security expert Professor Anthony Glees, from the University of Buckingham, said: ‘The French have signally failed to keep their country safe.’

He told MailOnline: ‘We in the great western democracies could now be on the verge of a sustained series of Al-Qaeda-IS attacks, generated by the hold that Islamists have in many places in the world, not least the IS state itself.

‘We cannot appease this movement - we have to win the security war against it and contain it, otherwise big trouble lies ahead.

Location: Officers were involved in a gunfight with the men, who escaped in a hijacked car and sped away from the office towards east Paris

'We have to be stand strong with the international community': A visibly shocked French President François Hollande arrives at the scene, where he promised to bring those responsible to justice

'100 LASHES IF YOU DON'T DIE OF LAUGHTER': HOW CHARLIE HEBDO HAS BECOME A BYWORD FOR ANTI-ISLAMISM Charlie Hebdo has become a byword for offensive statements in France after taking several highly provocative swipes at Islam. The newspaper once named Prophet Mohammed as its guest editor, published cartoons of the holy figure in the nude, and once renamed itself Sharia Hebdo with the cover slogan '100 lashes if you don't die of laughter'. The controversy began in 2006 when the publication reprinted now-infamous cartoons of Prophet Mohammed by Danish artist Kurt Westergaard. When the images originally appeared they lead to days of protests across the Middle East and in Western cities. The decision to reprint the images landed the then-editor in court under anti-terror laws, though he was later acquitted. The Hebdo offices were burned to the ground in 2011 when attackers used Molotov cocktails to start a blaze early in the morning of November 2. There was nobody in the building at the time, and the target was instead thought to be the newspaper's computer system, which was completely destroyed. Riot police were forced to stand guard outside the building for days following the attack, as the editors took a defiant stance, choosing to reprint the cartoon images multiple times. In 2012 they again printed cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed as a deliberately provocative gesture while violent protests were taking place across the Middle East. The following year the newspaper's office again had to be surrounded by riot officers after they published a cartoon booklet depicting the Prohpet naked as a baby and being pushed in a wheelchair. On the final page of the booklet there was a note from the editor, Stephane Charbonnier, saying the images were 'halal' because Muslims had worked on them, and that they were factually accurate as they had been derived from descriptions in the Koran. The satirical publication, widely seen as France's answer to Private Eye, prides itself on a mixture of tongue-in-cheek reporting and investigative journalism. Hebdo's current office building has no notices on the door to prevent a repeat of the attacks that have occurred in the past. In an interview with De Volkskrant in January 2013, Mr Charbonnier revealed he had been placed under constant police protection for four months after one of the cartoon issues was published. He shrugged off criticism that he was only publishing the images to gain notoriety for Hebdo, and insisted that he was instead defending the right to free speech. Mr Charbonnier pointed out that the newspaper had poked fun at feminism, nuclear energy and homeland security, but the Islam issues always attracted the most publicity. Advertisement

‘We need more and better intelligence-led activity at home and we need to defeat the IS state abroad.

‘It's not surprising that so many people in Europe are demonstrating against what they see as the Islamisation of Europe.

‘However, their target should not be the vast majority of European Muslims who want nothing to do with Islamism, but the political movement it has produced.

‘This isn't about religion or faith communities, it's about revolutionary politics and violence and only force can overcome it.’

The offices of the same newspaper were burnt down in a petrol attack in 2011 after running a magazine cover of the Prophet Mohammed as a cartoon character.

At the time, the editor-in-chief, Stephane Charbonnier, said Islam could not be excluded from freedom of the press.

He said: 'If we can poke fun at everything in France, if we can talk about anything in France apart from Islam or the consequences of Islamism, that is annoying.'

Mr Charbonnier, also known as Charb, said he did not see the attack on the newspaper as the work of French Muslims, but of what he called 'idiot extremists'.

The cover showed Mohammed saying: '100 lashes if you are not dying of laughter'.

This week's Charlie Hebdo also featured the author Houellebecq, whose new novel imagines Muslims taking over the French government in 2022.

Inside, there was an editorial, attributed to the Prophet Muhammad, and more cartoons - one showing the Prophet with a clown's red nose.

Depiction of the Prophet is strictly prohibited in Islam, but the newspaper denied it was trying to be provocative.

A firebomb attack gutted the headquarters of Charlie Hebdo in November 2011 after it put an image of the Prophet Mohammed on its cover.