Recent jihadist attacks around the world

Police in the Danish capital Copenhagen shot dead a man Sunday they believe carried out fatal shootings at a cultural centre hosting a debate on Islam and free speech and at the city's main synagogue.

Following is a chronology of jihadist attacks around the world over the past three years:

- In DENMARK on February 14 and 15, a gunman opens fire on a cultural centre in Copenhagen as it is hosting a forum about Islam and free speech attended by a Swedish cartoonist who has penned a controversial caricature of the Prophet Mohammed. A 55-year-old man is killed. Hours later a man is shot dead outside the city's main synagogue. Police later kill a man in a shootout at a railway station and say they believe he was responsible for both attacks.

Police say the gunman may have been inspired by the Islamist attacks in Paris in January 2015.

- In FRANCE on January 7, 2015, an attack on the Paris offices of the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo kills 12, including several well-known cartoonists, followed the next day by the shooting to death of a policewoman just outside the city. On January 9, the gunman who killed the policewoman takes hostages at a kosher supermarket in Paris. Four are killed during the siege and police shoot dead the hostage-taker when they raid the store.

The Charlie Hebdo assailants, who were killed by police after three days on the run, claimed they were avenging the publication by the weekly of cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed.

- In AUSTRALIA on December 15 and 16, 2014, two hostages and an extremist Iranian-born gunman, Man Haron Monis, are killed in a 16-hour siege involving 17 hostages that ends when police storm the Lindt Chocolate cafe in central Sydney.

Monis's supposed links to the Islamic State jihadist group come under scrutiny after he makes hostages at the cafe hold up a black flag commonly used by jihadist groups bearing the shahada, or profession of faith in Islam.

- In CANADA on October 23, 2014, a soldier is fatally shot near parliament in the capital Ottawa. His attacker, Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, who is shot dead when he attempts to storm parliament itself, was on a terror watch list.

The incident comes a day after another attacker, Martin Rouleau Couture, ran over a soldier in Montreal, killing him before being shot dead by police.

Ottawa has sent troops and jets as part of a US-led coalition to fight jihadists in Iraq. Both perpetrators in the Canadian attacks had recently joined the jihadist cause and planned to go and fight in Syria.

- In BELGIUM on May 24, 2014, four people, including two Israeli tourists, are killed when a gunman attacks the Jewish Museum in Brussels. French police arrest Franco-Algerian Mehdi Nemmouche in Marseille, southern France, six days later and hand him over to Belgian officials in late July.

Nemmouche, 29, has been charged with "murder in a terrorist context".

- In BRITAIN on May 22, 2013, soldier Lee Rigby, 25, is hacked to death by two Britons of Nigerian descent near an army barracks in southeast London.

Witnesses say the attackers encouraged them to film the scene as they shouted "Allahu Akbar" ("God is greatest") before being shot and arrested by the police. Footage shows one of the murderers saying he wants to avenge Muslims killed by British soldiers.

In February 2014, Michael Adebolajo, 29, is sentenced to life in prison for the murder while Michael Adebowale, 22, receives a minimum of 45 years behind bars.

- In the UNITED STATES on April 15, 2013, two handmade bombs placed near the finish line of the Boston marathon and detonated 12 seconds apart kill three people and wound 264.

A young Muslim of Chechen descent, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, a naturalised American since 2012, is now on trial accused of carrying out an act of terrorism with a weapon of mass destruction. His brother, also accused of perpetrating the attacks, is killed in a police shootout.

- In FRANCE on March 11 and 19, 2012, Mohamed Merah, 23, shoots three soldiers dead in Toulouse and Montauban, southern France, before killing three students and a teacher at a Jewish school in Toulouse.

Merah is killed on March 22 in a shootout following a siege of his apartment by French police.


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