A man armed with a knife killed two people at the main train station in the Mediterranean port city of Marseille on Sunday before being shot dead by soldiers patrolling there.

“Two victims have been stabbed to death,” the regional police chief, Olivier de Mazieres said according to The Guardian on Sunday.

The local prosecutor, Xavier Tarabeux, said the knifeman had been shot by soldiers, while Marseille police urged people in the city to avoid the area around Saint-Charles station.

The French interior minister, Gérard Collomb, said he was heading to Marseille immediately.