Paris: French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said on Tuesday that security would be stepped up nationwide following three successive, apparently unrelated bloody attacks, in a bid to ease growing unease in the country.
While the motives behind the incidents, a knife attack on police and two car rampages onto passers-by remain unclear, the violence has jarred nerves after repeated jihadist calls for "lone wolf" action in France over its fight against Islamic extremism.
"Fear over Christmas" titled local daily Le Parisien, while Le Figaro newspaper wrote a front-page editorial headlined "enemies from within."
Valls stressed that the three incidents were "distinct", urging the French to keep their calm and act with restraint while stressing security would be heightened.
"The number of patrols will be increased during this (Christmas) period. Two hundred to 300 soldiers will be deployed in the coming hours," he said live on television, after holding an emergency meeting with his ministers.
The violence began on Saturday when a man reportedly shouting "Allahu Akbar" was shot dead after walking into a police station in the central town of Joue-les-Tours and attacking three officers with a knife, two of whom were seriously injured.
Then on Sunday evening, a driver ploughed into pedestrians in Dijon in the east, injuring 13 people and also shouting the same Islamic phrase which means "God Is Greater" and has in the past been used by extremists when waging violent attacks.
And on Monday night, another man rammed into a bustling Christmas market with his car in the western city of Nantes, injuring 10 people, one of whom is in critical critical condition before stabbing himself repeatedly and being arrested.
