The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the assault on Saturday, calling the driver, Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, its “soldier”.
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Lahouaiej-Bouhlel, 31, drove at the crowd, zig-zagging along the seafront Promenade des Anglais for 1.25 miles.
All 84 people killed in the Nice truck attack have been formally identified, and the death toll for the Bastille Day carnage has not increased despite several people being still in critical condition, a top French official said Wednesday.
Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said 59 people remain in hospital, 29 of them in intensive care, out of 308 people injured overall.
Molins said that Bouhlel had in the days and two weeks prior to the July 14 attack sought to raise money through a bank loan, which was denied, a cash withdrawal and the sale of his auto.
French Prime Minister Manuel Valls was booed during a Nice memorial service for victims of last week’s terrorist attack that killed 84 people.
Lahouaiyej Bouhlel’s rapid radicalisation has puzzled investigators, and friends and family said he had not been an observant Muslim in the past.
Neighbours and relatives say the killer – who had a history of violence, mental instability, and was known to police – lived a life “far from religion”, drinking alcohol and having sexual relationships with both men and women.
While officials have said that France continues to face a extremely high security threat, French President Francois Hollande said in a television interview last week that there was no need to extend the measures as legal mechanisms to fight against terrorism had been ramped up in parliament.
The claims were published on social media channels in the name of Islamic State’s Aamaq news agency and in an online audio file of the daily news bulletin from the group’s al-Bayan radio.
“Mohamed didn’t pray, didn’t go to the mosque and ate pork”, Sadok Bouhlel, a 69-year-old retired teacher in the attacker’s hometown of Msaken, Tunisia, told the AP.
The French embassy in Wellington has held a minute’s silence to pay tribute to those who died in Nice.
“Even if these words are hard to say, it’s my duty to do so: there will be other attacks and there will be other innocent people killed”, he said.
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His brother Jabeur told Reuters Bouhlel called him for a final time on Thursday afternoon – just hours before the attack.
