British and Irish tourists are among 28 people who have been killed in a gun attack at a Tunisian beach resort.
The slaughter happened when a gunman, disguised as a tourist, opened fire on the busy beach in the town of Sousse, a popular destination for holidaymakers from the UK and Ireland.
The worst such attack in Tunisia's history came on the same day a man was found decapitated after an attack by suspected Islamic extremists on a French factory and a Shiite mosque in Kuwait was bombed killing at least 25 people.
Although the attacks do not appear to be directly linked they come after the so-called Islamic State called for their followers "to make Ramadan a month of calamities for the nonbelievers".
Tunisia's Health Ministry confirmed that those killed included Britons, Tunisians, Germans and Belgians. Thirty six others have been wounded.
Bodies covered in blankets were strewn across the beach and medical staff used sun loungers as stretchers to carry away the dead and injured.
Despite initially believing there was more than one gunman, the Tunisian authorities later said the killer was thought to be a young student who had not previously been known to their security services.
Witnesses said he used a Kalashnikov rifle hidden inside an umbrella to shoot the tourists sunbathing on the beach at the Riu Bellevue Park.
His killing spree ended when he was shot dead by police. A bomb was found on his body.
British tourist Ellie Makin, from Ripon, who was on holiday with her friend Debbie Horsfall from Huddersfield, said the gunman was next to them on a sunbed.
She told ITV News: "He was to the right of me because we were on the last sun bed on the beach. All of a sudden I got up anyway and just happened to look right and all I saw was a gun and an umbrella being dropped.
"Then he started firing to the right hand side of us. If he had fired to the left I don't know what would have happened, but we were very lucky."
Ms Horsfall added: "We were on the beach sunbathing, then the next thing we heard gunfire and Ellie shouted "gun, run" over and over.
"We got up and ran as fast as we could to our hotel reception. We just saw panic, everyone just got up and fled as soon as we realised it was gunfire."
The pair ran back to their hotel where other residents had gathered in the foyer but were in danger again when the gunman fired shots into the building.
Ms Makin said. "A guy ran up into the hotel and started shooting again and everyone fled. He was just below us, if we'd have walked down the stairs we'd have met him halfway.
"We got split up. I ran to a room upstairs with somebody and their kids and we hid. We were told to go to our room even though it was ground floor near where the shooting was, but I refused."
Another tourist Olivia Leathley, 24, was with her boyfriend Mike Jones in her room at the hotel when she heard "loud bangs" from the beach.
They ran to the lobby of the hotel where they found a woman whose husband had been shot in the stomach in front of her.
Miss Leathley said: "All she said was that he'd been shot and that he was there bleeding on the beach and he was just saying, "I love you I love you", and then his eyes rolled back into his head. But at that point she was dragged away by people who were trying to keep her safe."
An Irish woman is also understood to be among the 28 victims, an Irish government source said.
Those killed are more likely to be foreign as the local Muslim population is less likely to go to the beach during the holy month of Ramadan.
Tension has been high in Tunisia since an attack on the National Bardo Museum in March which killed 22 people, mostly foreign tourists including a Briton.
A suicide bomber blew himself up in a failed attack on the beach in Sousse in October 2013, while 21 people lost their lives in an attack in the country earlier this year.
The country has undergone unprecedented social and political change since the 2011 uprisings and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office says there is a ''high'' threat from terrorism.
Sousse is a city on the east coast of Tunisia, about 87 miles (140km) south of the capital, Tunis. Around 1.2 million tourists visit Sousse every year, drawn by the hotels, sandy beaches and culture.