A city official says police have detained a 17-year-old who took a class full of pre-schoolers hostage and that all the children have been released safely.

Jean-Marc Magda, aide to the mayor of Besancon, told The Associated Press that "the hostage-taking is over" and the hostage-taker is under police custody, still inside the school.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

PARIS (AP) _ Gendarmes entered a pre-school Monday where a 17-year-old armed with swords was holding several small children and their teacher hostage in eastern France.

Specialists officers in masks, their firearms pointed at the school's windows and doors, entered the building in the city of Besancon around lunchtime. They were in contact by telephone with the hostage-taker, according to an official with the regional police headquarters.

The hostage-taker initially seized a class of 20 children but released 14 throughout the morning. Five or six children and the teacher were believed to be still in the pre-school when the GIPN officers entered, said Besancon Mayor Jean-Louis Fousseret on i-tele television.

The teen's motives are unclear. Fousseret said he had been treated for depression but had not taken his medication in recent days. The mayor did not confirm reports that the youth had requested a gun to commit suicide.

Families huddled around the school, with children bundled against the cold, according to images on French television. Emergency workers draped a blanket over one woman's shoulders as she wept.

"A young man of 17 years old with two swords ... entered a pre-school class," Fousseret said on France-Info radio. The youth let five children go initially, then another eight and "another more or less escaped," Fousseret said.

"For the moment, I am optimistic," he said.

The pre-school was immediately surrounded by police and the other classes were evacuated. The children's families are being offered psychological and medical assistance.

The incident is taking place at the Charles Fourier pre-school in Planoise, a neighborhood of housing projects with a big immigrant population on the western edge of Besancon.

Pupils were still inside the adjacent elementary school.

"It's a bit traumatizing. ... We are just across from where everything is happening," principal Alain Lietta told The Associated Press by telephone. The schools' entrances are about 60 meters (yards) apart. Normally some children go home at lunch but "today, this poses a problem," he said.

He said the children in the elementary school were informed about the situation. "We wanted to give them a maximum of honesty and clarity so as not to scare them."

Education Minister Luc Chatel arrived at the pre-school and spoke with the families.

President Nicolas Sarkozy did not comment publicly about the hostage-taking.

Sarkozy first vaulted into France's national consciousness during a similar hostage-taking in 1993 in the posh Paris suburb of Neuilly-sur-Seine, where as mayor he helped free nursery school children and a teacher who had been taken hostage by a masked gunman.

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Associated Press writer Julien Proult contributed to this report.