Europe

1000s attend Unity Rally in Paris following attacks

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Following days of deadly attacks, hundreds of thousands of anti-terrorism protesters have gathered for a rally in the French capital, Paris, with world leaders and officials also attending the event.

The mass Unity Rally on Sunday comes after days of deadly attacks by gunmen, which claimed the lives of 17 people and three gunmen.

Reports say more than one million people are expected to attend the rally.

French President Francois Hollande said that Paris would be the capital of the world on Sunday, as crowds gathered in the city.

Prime Minister Manuel Valls also said that the rally should “show the power, the dignity of the French people who will be shouting out of love of freedom and tolerance.”

A similar rally was held on January 10 where people in cities from Toulouse in the south to Rennes in the west gathered to honor the victims.

Over 5,500 police forces have been deployed to guard the capital.

The prime ministers of Albania, Belgium, Britain, Bulgaria, Croatia, Denmark, Georgia, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Portugal, Spain, Turkey, Tunisia, the Czech Republic, and the Netherlands are among those scheduled to take part in the march.

European Union and US security ministers, as well as the leaders of NATO and the Arab League are also among dozens of representatives expected to be present.

The rally is taking place near the office of satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo, where two gunmen killed 12 people on January 7.

Two days later, two brothers, Said and Cherif Kouachi, suspected of murdering the journalists, were killed after being cornered at a printing workshop in the town of Dammartin-en-Goele.

On the same day, police ended a second and related hostage-taking at a Kosher supermarket in the eastern Porte de Vincennes area of Paris, killing one armed hostage-taker, Amedy Coulibaly, who was also a suspect in the killing of a policewoman in southern Paris a day earlier.

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