BREAKING NEWS: Two passengers are killed as attacker shouting 'Allahu Akbar' slits a woman's throat with a butcher's knife and stabs another at Marseille station before soldiers shoot him dead

• Attacker stabbed two female passengers at Gare de Marseille-Saint-Charles
• He was shot dead by the French army who swarmed the area this afternoon
• Reports claim he was heard shouting 'Allahu Akbar' before stabbing passengers 
• Both victims were women, one of whom was left 'with a sliced neck' 
  

  A man carrying a butcher's knife and shouting 'Allahu Akbar' killed two female passengers before being shot dead by soldiers at Marseille's train station in southern France. 

  The attack at Marseille's busiest train station took place early this afternoon, as scores of armed police officers and soldiers swarmed the area. 

  Both victims were women, with one left with a 'sliced neck'. The other was stabbed in the stomach. 

  Local official Oliver de Mazieres told AFP: 'Two victims have been stabbed to death.'

  The prosecutor for the area Xavier Tarabeux said the knife man was shot by soldiers, while Marseille police urged people in the city to avoid the area around Saint-Charles station.  

  The prosecutor's office in Paris said in a statement the probe would focus on 'killings linked to a terrorist organisation' and the 'attempted killing of a public official', two terror-related charges. 

  Early pictures from the scene showed a woman lying on the ground and armed police standing over a man on the floor. 

  It was not immediately clear whether that was the attacker or another man being arrested.