A gunman linked to the Charlie Hebdo killers was today holding up to five hostages in a Kosher store in eastern Paris.

Shots rang out close to the Porte de Vincennes while the two brothers believed to be behind the attack on the satirical magazine were themselves holed up north of the capital.

'There is a hostage situation - shots have been fired,' said a Paris police source, who said armed officers were attending the scene.

Early reports indicate the gunman has threatened to keep the hostages captive until the fugitive brothers currently under siege in northern France are set free.

There are also unconfirmed reports that two people have been killed.

Footage from a local broadcaster shows a team of heavily armed police officers swarming into the area. It has been reported more than one person has been taken hostage


Police offcers take cover behind a small wall as they face off with the hostage-taker


Armed police face off against the gunman, who is suspected to the person responsible for shooting policewoman Clarissa Jean-Philippe yesterday

The police source added: 'It is thought that there may be casualties. Around five hostages have been reported.'

Parisian schools near the hostage situation have now gone into lockdown.

It came as Said Kouachi, 34, and his brother, Cherif Kouachi, 33, the suspected Charlie Hebdo killers, remained surrounded by police with a hostage of their own in Dammartin-en-Goele.

It means that two sieges by suspected Islamic terrorists are playing out at the same time, as fears grew that the terrorists would be looking to cause another bloodbath.

The gunman in Vincennes is believed to be the one responsible for shooting a policewoman dead in south Paris on Thursday, said police sources.

The revelation has led police to link it to the murder of 12 people around the offices of the Charlie Hebdo satirical magazine on Wednesday.

Clarissa Jean-Philippe, 27, was unarmed and directing traffic in Montrouge, in south Paris, when she was gunned down by a man wearing body armour and using an automatic assault rifle.


The hostage situation is currently unfolding in Paris' 12th arrondissement, at the store pictured top left (circled)

The murderer, who is in his 30s, has been identified by police who said he belonged to the Buttes Chaumont network, which sent Jihadi fighters to Iraq.

'He was in the same Buttes Chaumount cell as the Kouachi brothers,' said a source close to the investigation. 'He was friends of both of them.'

Two of the Montrouge gunman's relatives were arrested in nearby Grigny during a police raid this morning.

Like the Kouchis, he is known to have been radicalised by an Islamic preacher in Paris, before expressing a wish to fight in Iraq or Syria.

Both men - who are currently surrounded in a building north of Paris - were first arrested in 2005.

They were suspected members of the Buttes Chaumont - a group operating out of the 19th arrondissement of Paris and sending terrorist fighters to Iraq.

Cherif was convicted in 2008 to three years in prison, with 18 months suspended, for his association with the underground organisation.

He had wanted to fly to Iraq via Syria, and was found with a manual for a Kalashnikov - the automatic weapon used in Wednesday's attack.

Said was freed after questioning by police, but - like his brother - was known to have been radicalised after the Iraq War of 2003, when Anglo-American forces deposed Saddam Hussein.

Both brothers were said to be infuriated by the killing of Muslims by western soldiers and war planes.


Pictured: French media identified this woman as Clarissa Jean-Philippe, the young policewoman who was gunned down as she attended a routine traffic accident in Montrouge at 8am yesterday

Vincent Olliviers, Cherif's lawyer at the time, described him as initially being an 'apprentice loser - a delivery boy in a cap who smoked hashish and delivered pizzas to buy his drugs.

But Mr Ollivier said the 'clueless kid who did not know what to do with his life met people who gave him the feeling of being important.'

After his short prison sentence, Cherif was in 2010 linked with a plot to free Smain Ait Ali Belkacem, the mastermind of the1995 bombing of the St Michel metro station in Paris that killed eight people and wounded more than 100 more.

Belkacem was a leading members of the GIA, or Armed Islamic Army - an Algerian terror outfit responsible for numerous atrocities.

The Kouachi brothers, who are orphans, were radicalised by an Iman operating in northern Paris.

They were raised in foster care in Rennes, in western France, with Cherif training as a fitness instructor before moving to Paris.

They lived in the 19th arrondissement and were radicalised by Farid Benyettou, a janitor-turned-preacher who gave sermons calling for jihad in Iraq and suicide bombings.

His Buttes-Chaumont recruitment group, named after a Paris park, sent at least a dozen young men to fight in Iraq.

The Kouachis share similar backgrounds to Mohammed Merah, the 23-year-old French Algerian responsible for murdering seven people, including four Jews and three Muslim soldiers, in the Toulouse area in 2012.

Merah, who was himself shot dead by police, had also been left to operate as a terrorist in France, despite the authorities knowing he had trained with Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan.

Last year Mehdi Nemmouche, a 29-year-old French Algerian, was arrested in Marseille in connection with an attack on the Jewish Museum in Brussels which left four people dead. He denies any crimes, and is currently on remand in Belgium.


A map showing the location of the two shootings on Wednesday and yesterday - as well as the movements of the police and Charlie Hebdo suspects since the first attack


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