Ammon News - AMMONNEWS - French media has reported that the gunman holding at least five hostages at a kosher grocery store in east Paris has been killed, shortly after blasts were heard at the site.

Police said that the gunman in Porte de Vincennes had threatened to kill the hostages if police launched an assault on the Kouachi brothers, who were suspected to be behind the attack on a satirical magazine earlier this week, and are cornered in a paper factory in northeastern Paris.

The brothers were also killed in a simultaneous police operation in Dammartin-en-Goele, northeast of Paris.

It is believed that none of the hostages at the supermarket were injured in the police raid.

The supermarket attacker is suspected of being the same gunman who killed a policewoman in a shooting in Montrouge in southern Paris on Thursday.

Police released the names of two suspects Amedy Coulibaly and his girlfriend Hayat Boumeddiene, who they say are wanted.

Sources close to the investigation said the shooting had happened at Porte de Vincennes in the east of Paris on Friday afternoon.

A lockdown is in place in schools close to the siege site.

French President Francois Hollande had held a meeting with Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve and Prime Minister Manuel Valls on Friday amid the police operations.

*Agencies