French PM says clear that Nice truck driver was radicalized quickly

Eighty-five victims of Bouhlel’s carnage were still hospitalized on Sunday, 18 of them in critical condition, officials said.

Though the Islamic State terrorist group claimed credit for the attack, investigators said they had not yet found evidence that Bouhlel pledged allegiance to any radical groups or had contact with known extremists, BBC reported.

In an affidavit seen by AFP, an officer who was among three stationed at the end of the famed Promenade des Anglais described Thursday’s bloody confrontation with Lahouaiej- Bouhlel.

Authorities are trying to determine whether Bouhlel, a 31-year-old who had lived in Nice for years, was acting alone in Thursday’s attack.

Former president Nicolas Sarkozy has criticised the French Government for failing its people, by not doing more to prevent the attacks in Nice and Paris.

Numerous dead and injured were children watching a Bastille Day fireworks display with their families.

He had scouted out the promenade before the attack, CCTV footage showed, and he is said to have sent texts to possible accomplices asking for more weapons.

After the ceremony, a man shouted abuse toward a group of people, including a woman wearing a hijab.

French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve on Saturday called on citizens to become reservists and help boost security forces in the wake of the country’s latest terror attack. While they all said he had always been indifferent to religion, some described a recent and very rapid conversion to radical Islam, the official said.

The nation has been left wondering whether the attack, in which a Tunisian man plowed a 19-ton refrigerated truck through crowds gathered for fireworks on Bastille Day, could have been avoided – or whether it must adjust to a harsh new reality. Authorities believe Bouhlel was radicalised very quickly, as he had never shown signs of religious fervour until recently.

France has begun its third day of national mourning as tributes to victims of the Nice lorry attack grow and investigations into their killer continues.

After an emergency security meeting yesterday, Cazeneuve promised to call up 12,000 police reserves to augment the 120,000-person security force?already dispersed across France.

Tunisian security sources have told the BBC he visited Tunisia frequently, the last time eight months ago.