Atleast 12 dead in shooting at satirical newspaper office in Paris.

At least 12 people were killed in a shooting Wednesday at French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, which has published cartoons of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad, police told reporters.

Two police officers were among those killed. Currently, the number of injured people is thought to be around 20, of which four are critically wounded, according to Reuters.
The 12 dead included two men who went by pen names Charb - editor and cartoonist at the magazine  and the cartoonist Cabu, the Paris prosecutor's office told the Associated Press.

One suspect has been killed while the other two were taken into custody, a U.S. counter-terrorism official told NBC News. Earlier on Wednesday, French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve told media that security forces were hunting for three gunmen, who fled towards the eastern Paris suburbs after holding up a car.

Cartoonists, economist and police officers among 12 dead in Paris attack http://t.co/vceYxWvdKN pic.twitter.com/CPu2QCkSHk
— CBC News (@CBCNews) January 7, 2015

Officials identified Frenchmen Said Kouachi and Cherif Kouachi, brothers in their early 30s, as well as 18-year-old Hamyd Mourad, whose nationality was not immediately known, as suspects in the shooting, according to NBC News. Cherif Kouachi served 18 months in prison after a terrorism conviction for helping funnel fighter to Iraq's insurgency, NBC News reported.

An official who spoke on the condition of anonymity told the AP that the men were linked to a Yemeni terrorist network, according to NBC News.


 France's terror alert was raised to the highest level after the shooting, President Francois Hollande told local media. He confirmed that several terrorist attacks had been foiled by security sources over recent weeks.

"There is possibility of other attacks and other sites are being secured," Police union official Rocco Contento told Reuters.

"Two black-hooded men entered the building with Kalashnikovs (guns)," journalist Benoit Bringer told French news channel iTELE, according to Reuters. "A few minutes later we heard lots of shots," he said, adding that the men were then seen fleeing the building.

A picture from the as-yet-unverified account of Le Monde journalist Elise Barthet apparently shows the shooters firing on a police car.