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French police have surrounded a building in a northern town where two men suspected of the Charlie Hebdo massacre are said to have a hostage, the BBC reported.

Shots have been fired and several people are said to have been wounded in Dammartin-en-Goele, 35km (22 miles) from Paris.

The development comes nearly 48 hours after the attack on the magazine's office, when 12 people were shot dead.

The heavily armed gunmen fled Paris by car after the attack.

The attackers, who shouted Islamist slogans, are believed to have been angered by the satirical magazine's irreverent depictions of the Prophet Muhammad.

They are said to have shouted "We are al-Qaeda, Yemen", an apparent reference to the al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula group (AQAP).

In the US, a senior official has told reporters that one of the two brothers alleged to have carried out the attack, Said Kouachi, spent "a few months" training in Yemen with the group.

Said and his younger brother, convicted terrorist Cherif Kouachi, were on a US no-fly list before the attack, a US counter-terrorism official told the New York Times.