Man detained over Paris bombing

Security forces cordoned off the area

Police in Paris have detained a man in connection with Thursday's parcel bomb attack at law offices which killed one person and injured several others.

A police source told the French news agency AFP that the man had been reported in 2005 for harassment of lawyer Catherine Gouet-Jenselme.

A secretary in the Gouet-Jenselme law firm was killed in the Paris bombing.

Police want to trace the female courier who brought the lethal package. It was reportedly addressed to the lawyers.

The office secretary, aged 60, opened the package, which contained two explosive devices concealed in a small wooden box. A lawyer nearby, 58-year-old Olivier Brane, was seriously injured.

The secretary's name has not been released.

The former law firm of President Nicolas Sarkozy is located in the same building in central Paris, but there was no suggestion of a link.

The building, on Boulevard Malesherbes, also houses The Foundation for the Memory of the Holocaust.

The bomb went off shortly before 1300 (1200 GMT) on the fourth floor of the building, police said.

"Someone came to the office and left a package. The secretary who opened it in fact opened a parcel bomb. The parcel bomb killed her," Christian Charriere-Bournazel, president of the Paris bar association, told the Associated Press news agency.

An eyewitness said he first heard a muffled explosion, and later saw a blonde woman carried out of the building.

"She was completely covered with blood, she was unconscious," Damien Laude told AP.

Mr Laude said he also saw a man with a head wound emerging from the building.

About 10 people were treated for shock, officials said.

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