The Saudi prince who fell victim to a spectacular armed raid in Paris, losing 250,000 euros in the process, was the youngest son of the former King Fahd with something of a globetrotting playboy reputation, it emerged Tuesday.

Sources at Le Bourget airport, where the prince's private jet was waiting, and police sources told Agence France Presse the victim was Abdul Aziz Bin Fahd, the multi-millionaire son of King Fahd, who died in 2005.

France's prime minister Tuesday paid tribute to the "courage" and "sacrifice" of the Paris police officers who, 70 years ago, retook their headquarters from the Nazis, kickstarting the liberation of the city.

While the Marseillaise national anthem resounded around the police headquarters, Manuel Valls laid a wreath to the memory of the 167 officers killed during the liberation and hailed "those who stood up to barbarism."

A French MEP and former minister has created a storm in France by posting a picture of a veiled woman sitting on a beach and criticizing it as an "attack on our culture".

Nadine Morano, a close ally of former president Nicolas Sarkozy, took a picture of the woman wearing a headscarf and posted it on her Twitter feed and Facebook page next to a famous photo of sex symbol Brigitte Bardot wearing a bikini.

Two climbers and their guide have fallen 800 meters to their death in the Mont Blanc range, police said on Monday, the latest in a series of tragedies on Europe's highest mountain.

"The fall of 800 meters (2,600 feet) gave them no chance," police said, adding they probably fell off a ridge that climbers must take to return to a nearby refuge hut.

Kalashnikov-wielding robbers have attacked the motorcade of a Saudi prince in Paris, making off with 250,000 euros ($335,000) in cash and reportedly stealing "sensitive" documents, French police said Monday.

The spectacular robbery took place in northern Paris late on Sunday as the motorcade was making its way from a plush hotel on the Champs Elysees to an airport in Le Bourget, said police, who confirmed there were no injuries.

French authorities are seeking to provide the Lebanese army with used weapons under a $3 billion deal financed by Saudi Arabia, the Kuwaiti al-Anbaa newspaper reported on Saturday.

According to the daily, Paris claims that the arms demanded by Lebanese military experts provoke Israel but the actual reason behind the delay in delivering the weapons is because Lebanon refuses to be granted used military equipment.

President Francois Hollande on Friday paid tribute to the hundreds of thousands of troops who, 70 years ago in World War II, launched the southern invasion of occupied France that opened up a second western front against Hitler's Nazis.

Joining Hollande for Friday's ceremonies were 15 leaders from France's former African colonies, in recognition of the key role soldiers from these countries played in liberating France, two months after D-Day smashed the first hole in Hitler's defenses.

The French economy ground to a standstill in the second quarter of the year, official figures published Thursday showed, further fanning fears that France could drag down a stuttering eurozone recovery.

France's gross domestic product was flat in the second three months of the year, according to national statistics office INSEE, following zero growth in the first quarter.

French prices dropped sharply in July compared to the previous month, official data published on Wednesday showed, adding to fears of deflation in France and the wider eurozone.

Prices fell by 0.3 percent month-on-month in July, the INSEE national statistics office said in a statement.

The leaders of France and Germany called Tuesday for the European Union to swiftly lend its weight to the humanitarian effort to help refugees in Iraq fleeing Islamic State militants.

In a joint statement, President Francois Hollande and Chancellor Angela Merkel said they wanted the EU to "participate as quickly as possible in the humanitarian operation under way to help the civilian population facing the acts of violence of Islamic State."