Militant attacks

There were a million fewer visitors between January and June compared with the same period in 2015.

Paris welcomes 16 million visitors a year and is one of the world's top tourist destinations.

The drop is estimated to have cost about €750m (£644m) in lost revenue. One senior official described it as "an industrial disaster".

France relies heavily on tourism, which generates more than 7% of its annual GDP.

About half-a-million people in the Ile-de-France region, which includes Paris, have jobs linked to tourism, making it the biggest employer in the area.

4:30 p.m.

An Associated Press reporter heard two explosions from the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing with Gaza and saw smoke rising, as a massive militant assault on Egyptian troops was underway some 40 kilometers (25 miles) away.

It was not immediately clear what caused the explosions or if the incident was linked to the coordinated assault on military targets in the northern Sinai Peninsula, which killed at least 50 Egyptian soldiers.