GRENOBLE, France - Twelve people were wounded when a grenade exploded in a bar in France's southeastern city of Grenoble on Wednesday, officials said.

"Someone came in and threw a grenade, apparently without saying a word, and ran away," prosecutor Francois Touret-de-Courcy told journalists at the scene, where emergency workers had cordoned off the area.

Two people were in critical condition, he said, adding that "many clients" were present when the grenade exploded, shortly after 8:00 pm (1900 GMT) at the bar in the Olympic Village neighbourhood, built when the picturesque city hosted the 1968 Winter Olympics.

Touret-de-Courcy said investigators had not yet identified a motive but did not believe it was a "terrorist attack".

"There's nothing to make us think it's linked to terrorism," he said, calling it an "act of extreme violence" that "may be linked to a settling of scores".

Investigators are looking at a possible connection to drug trafficking, he said, adding that some accounts indicated the suspect was also carrying a Kalashnikov assault rifle.

"I condemn in the strongest possible terms this criminal act of extraordinary violence," Grenoble Mayor Eric Piolle wrote on X.

Deputy Mayor Chloe Pantel told AFP the bar is "a spot where locals and people from outside the neighbourhood gather, especially to watch football matches".

France's Health Minister Yannick Neuder is due to visit victims and medical staff at Grenoble University Hospital on Thursday morning, according to a prefectural statement.

Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau will also make a previously scheduled visit Grenoble on Friday to discuss everyday safety issues.

AFP