Some 202 people were injured, in addition to the 84 who were killed in the Nice terror attack on Thursday night, the French prosecutor has said.
French officials revealed that 202 people are injured, including 52 people in a critical condition and with 25 of those in intensive care, although they said that this number could increase.
Hollande had said earlier in the day: “About 50 people are in an absolute urgency between life and death.”
The French leader said that there were a lot of foreigners and children among the dead and warned that the fight against extremist groups would be long because they would continue to try to strike at Western values, Reuters reports.
Hollande added that authorities are still trying to determine whether the truck driver, who travelled 2km through a crowded street last night, had any accomplices.
The attacker killed scores of people, including at least 10 children, who were gathered for a Bastille Day fireworks display in the Riviera city of Nice.
The driver opened fire before police shot him dead.
The attacker has been named by local media as 31-year-old Tunisian-born Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel.
The man was not on the watch list of French intelligence services, but was known to police in connection with common law crimes such as theft and violence, the source said.
The attack on France’s national holiday rocked a nation still dealing with the shock of the attacks last November in Paris that killed 130.
A state of emergency, which was imposed following the Paris attacks and was due to end on July 26 has now been extended for another three months.
President Hollande said this morning: “France called the carnage, which came as France celebrated the anniversary of the 1789 revolutionary storming of the Bastille, an attack on liberty by fanatics who despised human rights.
Hollande said that France would be bolstering its presence in Iraq and Syria, where he said earlier military advisers would be on the ground to help Iraqis take back the Islamic State stronghold of Mosul.
The regional president, Christian Estrosi, told BFM TV that more than 10 children were among the dead.
Local newspaper Nice Matin reports that 54 children have been admitted to the Lenval Hospital since Thursday night. Many are undergoing serious surgery at hospital today.
Witnesses said they saw parents frantically throwing their children over fences to avoid them being struck by the lorry, the Guardian reports.
Eyewitness Simon Saunders, who had been watching the firework display on the beach, was just about to leave the seafront when the truck attack began.
Writing in a blog published on the Huffington Post UK, Saunders said: “The terrorists timed their attack to the precise minute, so that the road would be full of people crossing the beach after the fireworks. It was the busiest moment possible.”
Restaurants and bars pulled their shutters down during the panic, Saunders recalled.
“Bars and restaurants closed their doors, buttoned down their hatches, let no one in, even to use the toilet,” he said.
“The owners were obviously terrified the same thing we’d all seen in Paris would happen here, that gunmen would go roaming. Instead, people raced by in panic, frantically dialing their friends.”
Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said police were trying to determine the driver’s identity, refusing to confirm reports an ID card had been found in the truck.
Police forces in the UK have been asked to review major events over the next week “to ensure the appropriate security is in place” following the Nice attack, the National Police Chiefs’ Council said on Friday.
France has lived with soldiers in the streets since the November attacks, and just days ago authorities beamed with pride at the close of the month-long European football championships that ended July 10 without incident.
Wassim Bouhlel, a Nice native, told The Associated Press that he saw a truck drive into the crowd.
“There was carnage on the road,” he said. “Bodies everywhere.” He said the driver emerged with a gun and started shooting.
Sylvie Toffin, a press officer with the local prefecture, said the truck ran over people on a “long trip” down the sidewalk that ended near Nice’s Palais de la Mediterranee, a building that fronts the beach.
The president of the Provence Alpes Côte d’Azur region, which includes Nice, said the truck was loaded with arms and grenades, although police have not confirmed that.
Hollande announced a series of measures to bolster security.
Besides continuing the state of emergency and the Sentinel operation with 10,000 soldiers on patrol, he said he was calling up “operational reserves,” those who have served in the past and will be brought in to help police, particularly at French borders.
President Barack Obama condemned what he said “appears to be a horrific terrorist attack.”
European Council president Donald Tusk said it was a “tragic paradox” that the victims of the attack in Nice were celebrating “liberty, equality and fraternity” - France’s motto - on the country’s national day.
