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A French policeman who swapped places with a hostage held by a terrorist during a deadly supermarket siege has been posthumously awarded the country's highest order of merit, the Legion of Honour, by President Emmanuel Macron.
Officer Arnaud Beltrame, who died in hospital after he was shot by attacker Redouane Lakdim, was honoured in an elaborate, day-long homage attended by former presidents and prime ministers and led by Mr Macron, who delivered a public eulogy.
The President described the policeman as a hero who made the ultimate sacrifice.
"As the name of his murderer already fell into oblivion, the name of Arnaud Beltrame became that of French heroism," Mr Macron said.
Beltrame's coffin was carried in procession from the Pantheon across Paris to the Hotel des Invalides — the final resting place of Napoleon.
Around the country, minutes of silence were held in schools and in police stations.
Two French cities, Pau and Beziers, have voted to name a street in Beltrame's name, while the mayor of Versailles plans to do the same.
After taking the place of a female hostage, Beltrame, a qualified parachutist who served in Iraq in 2005, managed to secretly place his mobile phone with an open line on a table near himself and Lakdim.
"That way we were able to hear what was going on at a given moment," Interior Minister Gerard Collomb said.
The gunman then opened fire on Beltrame, and the sound prompted commando units to storm the Trebes Super U supermarket, when they killed the gunman.
Beltrame was raced to hospital but later died from his injuries. Two others died during the siege.
He was in his mid-40s and also worked as part of the elite Republican Guard that protects the Elysee Palace offices and the president's residence in Paris.
ABC/wires
Topics: law-crime-and-justice, death, france