Prosecutors said a French woman was battling for her life in hospital on Monday after her long-term partner slashed both eyes in an apparent attempt to kill her.

According to them, the man was detained but is now being treated in a hospital owing to his mental state.

The victim is in critical condition after the suspect repeatedly stabbed her on Sunday in the town of Maisons-Alfort to the southeast of Paris.

Police arrested the suspect on Sunday afternoon, but released him “as a result of the forced hospitalization”, said the public prosecutor’s department in the Paris suburb of Creteil.

The alleged perpetrator, around 40 years old, was not known to the police.

The couple has four children, who were not present at the time of the attack.

The judicial police of the Val-de-Marne department is handling the investigation.

There has been mounting concern about femicides in France with 102 women killed by their current or former partners in 2020 and 146 in 2019, according to France’s Interior Ministry.

According to the ministry, more than 200,000 women in France are victims of domestic violence each year.