Brazilian woman identified as victim of Nice church attack 

Brazilian-born Simone Barreto Silva, 44, succumbed to her injuries after seeking refuge in a nearby burger bar

One of the three victims of an extremist knife attack in a church in France Thursday was a 44-year-old Brazilian mother of three, the Brazil foreign ministry announced.

The woman was seriously wounded in the attack on the Notre-Dame Basilica in Nice, in the southeast of France, by a 21-year-old Tunisian immigrant who had recently arrived in the country.

She managed to flee to a nearby bar, but died shortly after, police sources have said.

"Tell my children I love them," she managed to say before her death, according to a report by French cable channel BFM TV.

"The Brazilian government regretfully announces that one of the fatalities was a 44-year-old Brazilian mother of three children, living in France," a statement from the foreign ministry said.

It did not confirm whether she also had French nationality.

(From L) French Justice Minister Eric Dupond-Moretti, French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin, French President Emmanuel Macron and Nice Mayor Christian Estrosi visit the scene of a knife attack at the Basilica of Notre-Dame de Nice

Credit: ERIC GAILLARD /AFP

In a near half-hour frenzy in the Notre-Dame basilica in the center of Nice, on the Mediterranean coast, the assailant used a knife of 30 centimeters (12 inches) to cut the throat of a 60-year-old woman so deep that he practically beheaded her, French authorities have said.

The French interior minister on Friday warned France is engaged in a war against Islamist ideology and more militant attacks on French soil are likely.

"We are in a war against an enemy that is both inside and outside," Gerald Darmanin told RTL radio. "We need to understand that there have been and there will be other events such as these terrible attacks."

A judicial source said a 47-year-old man had been taken into custody on Thursday evening on suspicion of having been in contact with the perpetrator of the attack.

Chief anti-terrorism prosecutor Jean-Francois Ricard said the man suspected of carrying out the attack was a Tunisian, born in 1999, who had arrived in Europe on Sept. 20 in Lampedusa, the Italian island off Tunisia that is a main landing point for migrants from Africa.

People pay tribute in front of the Notre Dame Basilica

Credit: Arnold Jerocki /Getty Images Europe 

A Tunisian security source and a French police source named the suspected attacker as Brahim Aouissaoui. Mr Ricard said the suspected attacker had entered the city by train early on Thursday morning.

The suspect was in hospital in critical condition, he said.

The Nice attack occurred just under two weeks after a school teacher in a Paris suburb was beheaded by an 18-year-old attacker who was apparently incensed by the teacher showing a cartoon of the Prophet Mohammad in class.