In south-east France, a man killed five family members and was then shot dead by police.
The 22-year-old man had been holed up in the family home in the village of Douvres east of Lyon since Tuesday evening, investigators said on Wednesday.
On Wednesday morning, security forces stormed the house and killed the man.
A motive for the act was not immediately known.
The five dead are members of the man's patchwork family, said Mayor Christian Limousin.
Three children were among the dead.
Details of the family relationships were not initially known.
The family has lived in the town since 2020.
Firearm and Japanese sword
The man had been armed with a gun and a Japanese sword.
The police had surrounded the house and cordoned off a large part of the center of the town with its approximately 1,000 inhabitants.
Around a hundred police officers and forensic technicians were on site.
Security forces had tried unsuccessfully to contact the man all night, a source familiar with the case told AFP.
The public prosecutor initially did not want to comment.
An acquaintance of the family stated that the perpetrator was 22 years old and worked for a fast food chain in a nearby town.
Tania, a 30-year-old woman who runs the cafe in the village, told AFP: "This morning at 8.30am the gendarmes asked me not to open my bar.
The mother of one of the victims called me and said that since yesterday she has not been able to contact her daughter.” It is one of the worst cases of this type in France in recent years.
In October 2020, a father killed his wife, two children and two nephews in Noisy-le-Sec in the Ile-de-France region.