A man who holed up in a post office in a suburb northwest of Paris with two hostages on Friday surrendered and has been arrested, a police source said.

"There was no assault, the man gave himself up", the source said, adding that the hostages were "shocked but not injured".

Earlier, it was reported that an armed man was holed up in a post office outside Paris with two hostages, quoting French police.

However, the police said there did not appear to be any link to extremist attacks.

The police sources had said several post office clients had managed to escape and that the gunman himself had called them.

The sources had said he was "speaking incoherently" and was heavily armed with grenades and Kalashnikovs.