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		</div><p>A Gunman who opened fire on a high-speed train travelling from Amsterdam to Paris was beaten unconscious by three Americans.</p>
<p>Two of them were soldiers, and one was taken to hospital with serious injuries, while another passenger on the train was wounded in the throat.</p>
<p>President Barack Obama said the heroic actions of the Americans may have prevented a far worse tragedy.</p>
<p>Anthony Sadler, a student at Sacramento State University in California told The Associated Press that his two travelling companions were in the military.</p>
<p>He said the injured American was Spencer Stone of Sacramento, and the other was Alek Skarlatos of Roseburg, Oregon.</p>
<p>&#8220;We heard a gunshot, and we heard glass breaking behind us, and saw a train employee sprint past us down the aisle,&#8221; Mr Sadler said.</p>
<p>They saw a gunman entering the train car with an automatic rifle, he said.</p>
<p>&#8220;As he was cocking it to shoot it, Alek just yells, &#8216;Spencer, go!&#8217; And Spencer runs down the aisle,&#8221; Mr Sadler said.</p>
<p>&#8220;Spencer makes first contact, he tackles the guy, Alek wrestles gun away from him, and the gunman pulls out a box cutter and slices Spencer a few times. And the three of us beat him until he was unconscious.&#8221;</p>
<p>He added: &#8220;The gunman never said a word.&#8221;</p>
<p>Mr Stone helped another passenger who had been wounded in the throat and losing blood, Mr Sadler said.</p>
<p>The suspect is a 26-year-old Moroccan, according to Sliman Hamzi, an official with the police union Alliance, who spoke on French television station i-Tele.</p>
<p>Investigators from France&#8217;s special anti-terror police are leading the investigation, a spokeswoman for the Paris prosecutor&#8217;s office said.<br />
In Washington, the Pentagon said it &#8220;can only confirm that one US military member was injured in the incident. The injury is not life-threatening.&#8221;</p>
<p>The White House issued a statement saying that Mr Obama was briefed on the shooting, and said: &#8220;While the investigation into the attack is in its early stages, it is clear that their heroic actions may have prevented a far worse tragedy.&#8221;</p>
<p>French interior minister Bernard Cazeneuve, speaking in Arras in northern France where the suspect was detained, said: &#8220;As always where an act that could be terrorist in nature is involved, the greatest care and the greatest precision will be used.&#8221;</p>
<p>He said the Americans &#8220;were particularly courageous and showed great bravery in very difficult circumstances,&#8221; and that &#8220;without their sangfroid we could have been confronted with a terrible drama&#8221;.</p>
<p>Philippe Lorthiois, an official with the Alliance police unionLorthiois said contrary to earlier reports, the attacker did not fire his automatic weapon but wounded one man with a handgun and the other with a blade of some kind.</p>
<p>A third person, French actor Jean-Hugues Anglade, suffered a minor injury while activating the train&#8217;s emergency alarm, he said.</p>
<p>The attack took place at while the Thalys train was passing through Belgium, according to a statement from the office of France president Francois Hollande.</p>
<p>He said he has spoken with Belgian prime minister Charles Michel, and the two leaders pledged to co-operate closely on the investigation.</p>
<p>Passenger Christina Coons of New York described the drama in carriage 12 of the train in an interview with Ouest France newspaper.</p>
<p>&#8220;I heard shots, most likely two, and a guy collapsed,&#8221; she said.</p>
<p>Ms Coons, identified as a 28-year-old on holiday in Europe, said a window broke above one woman&#8217;s head: &#8220;A guy fell to the floor and had blood everywhere.&#8221;</p>
<p>She described lying on the floor herself and taking photos with her phone.</p>
<p>&#8220;I thought there would be a shoot-out in the train,&#8221; she said.</p>
<p>Europe&#8217;s major railway stations, such as Paris&#8217; Gare du Nord and Brussels&#8217; Gare du Midi, are patrolled by soldiers armed with rifles, but passengers can board most high-speed trains without passing through metal detectors or having their bags searched.</p>
<p>One exception is the Eurostar between Paris and London. Passengers on those trains must pass through a metal detector and have their bags scanned as well.</p>
<p>Thalys is owned by the French and Belgian railways and operates high-speed trains serving Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam and Cologne, Germany.</p>
<p>French authorities have been on heightened alert since Islamic extremist attacks in January left 20 people dead, including the three attackers.</p>
<p>Mr Stone is with the Air Force stationed in the Azores and Mr Skarlotos, a 22-year-old National Guardsman, had returned from a deployment in Afghanistan in July, according to his stepmother Karen Skarlotos.</p>
<p>She spoke to her stepson immediately after the incident: &#8220;He sounded fine, but he was intense &#8211; he sounded like he had just thwarted a terrorist attack.</p>
<p>&#8220;Alek and Spencer, they&#8217;re big, brave, strong guys and they decided they were going to tackle him. And they did. Spencer tackled him, and Alek took the gun and clobbered him a good one,&#8221; she told the AP from Oregon.</p>
<p>&#8220;Spencer got a couple good slices on him. But they were able to subdue him while the train was still moving.&#8221;</p>
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