Category Archives: France

French MP’s Vote on Constitution Changes in Wake of Paris Attacks

On Wednesday, French MP’s voted overwhelming to change state-of-emergency provisions in the constitution, which were drawn up after the November 2015 terror attacks in Paris.

The lower house voted 317-199 in order to adopt the package of measures, which includes changes to give a new status under the constitution to the state of emergency, which is currently in force. There were 51 abstentions. The package of measures also allows terror convicts to be stripped of their citizenship. The package will now go to the Senate before a meeting of the joint houses of parliament. It needs support from the Senate and will then have to be approved by a two-thirds vote of a joint session of parliament, which is likely to take weeks or months. Nevertheless, Wednesday’s vote is a significant victory for the French government, which has faced opposition from leading voices, and some from amongst its own ranks. Speaking shortly after the vote, Prime Minister Manuel Valls disclosed that he was “satisfied” with the result and that he was confident that senators would also approve the changes.

In the wake of the 13 November 2015 terror attacks in Paris by gunmen and suicide bombers who targeted a concert hall, a major stadium, restaurants and bars, leaving 130 people dead and hundreds wounded, French President Francois Hollande promised changes as his government seeks to ensure the French people that they are safe, despite growing threats and several previous attacks and thwarted attempts.

Several government officials however are opposed to the new changes. Two weeks ago, France’s left-wing justice minister, Christian Taubira, resigned, citing a “major political disagreement” with the government. She was amongst several political figures who objected to the government’s proposals because they singled out those with dual nationality. Despite the opposition, government whips have indicated that they are confident of a majority in the lower house. However it must be noted that even if they are correct, there is still a long parliamentary battle that lies ahead.

Under the current terms of the state of emergency, which has been in place since 13 November, police are allowed to raid homes and hold people under house arrest. The state of emergency is due to expire on 26 February, however the government wants the powers extended. Under Article 1 of the constitutional reform proposals, MP’s will have to approve a state of emergency beyond twelve days. This rule is already observed, but including it in the constitution is intended to protect it from legal challenges. MP’s have also backed an amendment requiring any extension beyond four months to be referred back to them. On Tuesday, the chamber was only a quarter full during the vote, with 441 deputies absent out of a total of 577. The house later voted through the proposal on nationality however the amendment does not mention dual nationality.

Paris 13 November Terror Attacks: Who Were The Attackers?

French officials investigating the deadly 13 November terror attack in Paris have identified most of the people they believe to have carried out the assaults, which were claimed by the so-called Islamic State (IS) group.

While the attacks are suspected to have been masterminded by Abdelhamid Abaaoud, who was killed in a police raid in Saint-Denis a few days later, two suspects remain on the run.

Bar and Restaurant Attackers

Salah Abdeslam

Authorities have identified Abdeslam, a 26-year-old French national born in Brussels, as a key suspect and has been the subject of a massive police manhunt in Belgium and beyond. He has been described as dangerous, with police officials warning the public not to approach him. While his current whereabouts remain unknown, reports have surfaced that despite heightened security, he may have managed to leave Europe for Syria. These reports however have not been confirmed.

Abdeslam is believed to have rented a VW Polo car in Belgium, which was later found near the Bataclan concert hall. However he also rented a Renault Clio and reserved two hotel room just outside Paris before the attacks. While his precise role in the attacks themselves remains unclear, his brother, Brahim, blew himself up. Investigators do believe that Salah Abdeslam may have driven the three Stade de France bombes to their destination and may have been given the job of an attack a short distance south, in the 18^th district in Paris. That attack however never occurred. Hours after the 13 November attacks, Salah Abdeslam was in a vehicle with two other men near the Belgian border when they were stopped at least once by police.   They were allowed to drive on after checks. It remains unclear whether French authorities had matched his name to the car found at the Bataclan by the time he was stopped. As the search for Salah Abdeslam intensified across Belgium, Brussels was placed on lockdown, and his brother, Mohamed, who was briefly detained by the authorities, later appealed for him to give himself up.

Salah Abdeslam has a past of petty crime, with Belgian prosecutors stating that they had questioned him and his brother Brahim earlier this year. Some reports have indicated that he spent time in prison for robbery, where he met suspected ringleader Abdelhamid Abaaoud. He had earlier been dismissed as a technician on the Brussels tram system for missing work. Dutch police have also disclosed that they had detained Salah Abdeslam briefly in February, fining him £49 for possession of cannabis.

At the end of last month, Moroccan authorities issued an arrest warrant for Salah Abdeslam. According to a Moroccan security source, it remains unclear whether Salah Abdeslam had fled to Morocco or North Africa. German police launched a search after a tip-off that he was there.

Brahim Abdeslam

Brahim Abdeslam is the brother of Salah Abdeslam. According to French investigators, Brahim died after he set off his explosives-laden suicide belt near a Parisian café on Boulevard Voltaire.

The 31-year-old had rented a Seat car, which was found the day after the attacks at Montreuil, which is located to the east of Paris. He had earlier appeared in several Belgian police files alongside Abdelhamid Abaaoud. The documents relate to criminal cases in 2010 and 2011. According to Belgium’s De Standaard newspaper, “investigators see a link with Verviers,” referring to a Belgian town where police shot dead two militants in January and broke up a a cell that was aiming to kill Belgian police offices. That raid occurred just days after the January Charlie Hebdo attacks in Paris. Belgian judicial officials have also disclosed that earlier this year, Brahim Abdeslam had travelled to Turkey intending to go on to Syria however he was deported back to Brussels by Turkish authorities. Sources have indicated that while he was questioned on his return to Belgium, he was later released.

Both Brahim Abdeslam and Abaaoud lived in Molenbeek, which is a district of Brussels that has a substantial Muslim population. Some Belgian authorities have described the district as a “breeding ground for jihadists.”

Abdelhamid Abaaoud

Abaaoud, 28, has been described by the authorities as the suspected ringleader of the attacks. He died on 18 November in a long gun battle with police, who raided a flat in the northern Paris suburb of Saint-Denis. Investigators believe that he was involved in the bar and restaurant killings as his fingerprints were found on a Kalashnikov that was left in the Seat car that was abandoned in Montreuil.

Abaaoud grew up in the Brussels district of Molenbeek and was an associate of Salah Abdeslam. He has been implicated in four out of six attacks that have been foiled this year and is believed to have joined IS in 2013. Belgian police believe that he had been in Athens, directing a militant cell in Verviers in eastern Belgium when it was raided by security forces in mid-January. While Greek authorities had been following him, he managed to evade a police raid. Sources have reported that Abaaoud had also been in contact with Mehdi Nemmouche, who is accused of shooting dead four people at the Jewish Museum in Brussels in May 2014. According to lawyer Nathalie Gallant, Abaaoud’s father had become aware in the past month of his son’s links to terrorism and he believed that he had become a psychopath.

Third Attacker

Officials have not yet identified the third attacker. Furthermore, it remains unclear whether he escaped or later died in the police raid on the Saint-Denis flat.

Bataclan Concert Hall Attackers

Omar Ismail Mostefai

Just eight days before his 30^th birthday, the French national of Algerian descent blew himself up after the massacre at the Bataclan. He was later identified from a finger-tip that was found in the concert hall.

Omar Mostefai was born in the Parisian suburb of Courcouronnes. He was known to police as a petty criminal. Between 2004 and 2010, he received eight convictions however he never spent any time in prison. Between 2005 and 2012, he lived in Chartres, near Paris, where he reportedly worked as a baker and played football with fellow employees. He attended a mosque with his father. While a local Islamic association leader has disclosed that he never showed any signs of being an extremist, with several residents reporting that the family was “very nice,” in 2010, French authorities identified him as a suspected Islamic radical, with his details entered in a database.

Despite his name in a database, Omar Mostefai appears to have been able to travel to Syria and he may have also spent time in Algeria. A senior Turkish official has confirmed that Omar Mostefai entered Turkey in 2013, adding that there was no record of him leaving the country. According to the official, in October 2014, Turkey had received an information request from French authorities pertaining to four terror suspects. During the official investigation, Turkish authorities identified a fifth individual, Omar Mostefai, and notified their French counterparts twice – in December 2014 and June 2015. The official disclosed that “we have, however, not heard back from France on the matter,” adding that it was only after the Paris attacks that the Turkish authorities received an information request about Omar Ismail Mostefai from France.

Samy Amimour

The 28-year-old Frenchman was another of the suicide bombes who blew himself up at the Bataclan.

He lived in the northeastern Paris suburb of Drancy and had been known to French intelligence services. In 2012, he was charged with terror offences over claims that he had planned to go to Yemen. While he was placed under judicial supervision, he later dropped off the radar, which prompted the authorities to issue an international arrest warrant. In 2014, Le Monde newspaper published an account of the journey of a 67-year-old Parisian man to Syria, in the hope of persuading his son to leave IS and return to France. While Pseudonyms were used in the original article, it has since been updated to reveal that the son in question was Amimour. With his son refusing to leave, the father later returned home without him. French media have since pointed out that Amimour was able to enter France prior to the attacks. He entered undetected despite the arrest warrant. Three of Amimour’s relatives were reportedly arrested shortly after the Paris attacks.

Foued Mohamed-Aggad

It took French authorities more than three weeks in order to identify the third Bataclan bomber. DNA from Foued Mohamed-Aggad’s Moroccan-born mother in Strasbourg was used in order to confirm his role in the concert hall massacre.

French media have reported that the 23-year-old was initially lured to Syria by one of France’s most infamous jihadist recruiters, Mourad Fares. Sources have disclosed that he went to Syria with his older brother Karim at the end of 2013. Eight other young men from the Meinau district of Strasbourg also went with them, however seven of the group returned from Syria within two months when two of them were killed. Only Foued Mohamed-Aggad remained, until he eventually came home to take part in the Paris attacks.

Stade de France

 ‘Ahmad al-Mohammad’

This man was the first of three to blow himself up at the Stade de France stadium. A Syrian passport, which bore his name, was found at the scene. While the passport suggests that he was a 25-year-old from the Syrian city of Idlib, authorities believe that this passport is a fake. A report in a Serbian newspaper, Blic, has said that a passport bearing the same name and data, however a different image, had been found on another migrant, suggesting that both men had bought fake documents from the same counterfeiter.

The Paris prosecutor’s office has disclosed that fingerprints from the dead attacker matched those of a person who came to Europe with migrants via the Greek Island of Leros. The man may have been posing as a Syrian refugee. Records from Leros suggest that he arrived on 3 October and was fingerprinted and photographed. An official in Leros has since disclosed that he remembers the man arriving, stating that something did not feel right about him and that he kept himself to himself. The official further indicated that he would have highlighted his concerns to an intelligence officer, had one been there. Leros authorities have indicated that they simply do not have the resources in order to screen all the migrants effectively, or even to check whether their passports are genuine.

Bilal Hadfi

Authorities have named the 20-year-old as one of the attackers who died at the Stade de France. According to officials he tried to get into the stadium while France was playing a friendly match against Germany, however he was denied entry and blew himself up in the nearby rue de la Cokerie.

He was a French national who had been living at Neder-over-Hembeek in Belgium. Belgian media have reported that he was radicalized in early 2014. Belgian prosecutors have also disclosed that while they were aware that he had gone to fight with IS in Syria, they did not know that he had returned.

‘M al-Mahmod’

A picture of the third suicide bomber at the Stade de France has been issued by French police. He has been named by media as M al-Mahmod. He blew himself up in front of one of the entrances to the stadium, on rue Rimet.

According to officials, he entered the Greek Island of Leros on 3 October and was travelling with Ahmad al-Mohammed. While French police have not yet named him, sources have disclosed that image released by the authorities matches a photo on arrival papers at Leros, adding that the two men purchased ferry tickets to leave Leros to continue their journey through Europe with other Syrian refugees.

Other Suspects

Saint-Denis

Hasna Aitboulahcen, a cousin of Abdelhamid Abaaoud, died with him in the gun battle that occurred at the Saint-Denis flat. Another man, who has yet to be identified, blew himself up at the flat.

Aitboulachen, the daughter of Moroccan immigrants, was tracked by French police who had tapped her phone after the 13 November attacks. According to sources, she was seen leading Abaaoud into the flat just hours before the police raid occurred. She had been radicalized only in recent months and was thought to have had a brief conversation with police before she died.

While initial reports indicated that she had blown herself up, police later disclosed that it was a man that had done so. While he has not been identified, there have been suggestions that he may have taken part in the attacks on bars and restaurants in the 10^th and 11^th districts of Paris alongside Abaaoud and Brahim Abdeslam.

Jawad Bendaoud

Jawan Bendaoud, 29, was arrested during the Saint-Denis raid. He is said to have rented the flat to Abaaoud and Hasa Aitboulahcen. He told French media before he was questioned by police that a friend had asked him to look after “two mates who wer coming from Belgium.” He further stated that “I said there was no mattress but they told me its not a big deal. They just wanted water and to pray.” A girlfriend, Hayet, who was with Jawan Bendaoud on the night of the Paris attacks, has since disclosed that he suddenly realized that he was in trouble. What occurred in the days prior to the raid on Saint-Denis remains unclear however Hayet believes that her friend had seen the state of the flat and was “aware of what was going on.” Bendaoud has been in trouble with the police in the past and has served time in prison.

Belgian connection

Mohammed Amri, 27, and Hamza Attouh, 21, were arrested in Belgium. They later admitted to picking up Salah Abdeslam in France and driving him back to Brussels in a Volkswagen Golf. Accoridng to officials, the pair received a phone call from Salah Abdeslam at 0500 on Saturday, stating that his car had broken down. While they insisted that no mention was made of the attacks, which had been carried out in Paris just a few hours earlier, Hamza Attouh stated that he was wearing thick clothing and may have been preparing to blow himself up. They also provided conflicting versions of where in Brussels they had dropped Salah Abdeslam off.

Abraimi Lazez, 39, was arrested in the Belgian town of Laeken, in a car where two guns and traces of blood were found. He has been suspected of helping Salah Abdeslam flee France in the hours after the attacks.

A French national, who has been named by police as Ali O, has been accused by Belgian authorities of taking part in the actions of a terrorist group and a terrorist attack. Police believe he may also have driven Salah at one point.

Two days prior to the 13 November attacks, Salah was spotted in the Renault Clio, which was used to drop off the Stade de France attackers. He was spotted with another suspect.

Belgian police have disclosed that they are now also hunting Mohamed Abrini, 29, who was driving the car with Salah Abdeslam as a passenger when it stopped at a petrol station in Ressons, which is located on the motorway to Paris.

Ahmad Dahmani, a 26-year-old Belgian national, is being held in Turkey after he flew to the resort of Antalya. He is suspected of being involved in preparations for the Paris attacks.

Third Paris Bataclan Music Venue Attacker Identified

Last week on Wednesday 9 December, French Prime Minister Manuel Valls announced that French police have identified the third attacker at the Bataclan during the Paris attacks.

While Mr Valls did not name the man, he also did not dispute media reports, which have named him as French national Foued Mohamed-Aggad, aged 23, from Strasbourg. On the night of 13 November, three men stormed the Bataclan at around 21:40 local time, during a concert by the Eagles of Death metal rock group. They opened fire on concern-goers, repeatedly reloading their guns before police arrived at the scene. Ninety people were killed at the Bataclan. All three gunmen who attacked the venue, and who were wearing suicide vests, have been confirmed as French nationals.

According to sources, Mohamed-Aggad reportedly travelled to Syria in late 2013 as part of a group of radicalized youth from Strasbourg, which included his brother. While several members of that group were arrested upon returning to France in the spring of last year, Mohamed-Aggad is believed to have remained in Syria. According to sources, Mohamed-Aggad was identified late last week by police after DNA samples were confirmed to match with members of his family.

The two others who blew themselves up at the Bataclan last month were identified as Frenchmen Omar Ismail Mostefai, 29, and Samy Amimour, 28.   Mostefai was identified from a finger-tip that was found at the venue. He was reported to have previously worked as a baker in Chartres, near Paris, however in 2010, authorities identified him as a suspected extremist. Amimour, from the northeastern Paris suburb of Drancy, had been charged with terror offences in 2012 over claims that he was planning to travel to Yemen. After being placed under judicial supervision, he disappeared, which prompted French authorities to issue an international arrest warrant.

One source has indicated that we are now sure that Mostefai, Amimour, Mohamed Aggad, Bilal Hadfi and suspected ringleader Abdelhamid Abaaoud had travelled to Syria, adding that Mohamed-Aggad was slightly different as it appears that he likely spent longer in Syria than the others. Additionally, two of the Stade de France attackers were believed to have come to Europa via the Greek Island of Leros, with officials noting that they may have been posing as Syrian refugees.

French media are reporting that Mohamed-Aggad was recruited by Mourad Fares, a man known to have actively recruited young Frenchmen on behalf of jihadist groups operating in Syria. Fares was arrested last year in Turkey. At the time, French Inferior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve described him as a “particularly dangerous individual close to jihadist terrorist movements” including the so-called Islamic State (IS) group. He was placed under provisional detention in France in September 2014 and is being prosecuted for a number of terrorism-related offenses in France and Syria.

One other Paris attacker remains to be identified.

The other attackers who took part in the co-ordinated attacks around Paris, which killed 130 people in total, have either been identified as home-grown French or Belgian extremists.

Officials Warn that IS May Be Seeking to Develop Chemical/Biological Weapons

Late last week, French Prime Minister Manuel Valls warned that France could face a chemical or biological attack from terror groups, as deputies voted to extend the state of emergency, which was imposed after the attacks, for another three months from 26 November. Speaking to the lower house of Parliament on Thursday ahead of the vote, the prime minister stated that “terrorism hit France not because of what it is doing in Iraq and Syria…but for what it is,” adding, “we know that there could also be a risk of chemical or biological weapons,” however he did not talk of a specific threat.

On Thursday, US and Iraqi intelligence officials also reported that IS is aggressively pursuing development of chemical weapons, setting up a branch that is dedicated to research and experiments with the help of scientists from Iraq, Syria and elsewhere in the region.   While US intelligence officials currently do not believe that IS has the capabilities to develop sophisticated weapons, such as never gas, that are most suited for a terrorist attack on a civilian target, the Islamist terror group has in the past used mustard gas on the battlefield in Syria and Iraq. Militants have used mustard gas against Iraqi Kurdish fighters and in Syria. In mortars that hit Kurdish forces in northern Iraq earlier this year, preliminary tests by the US showed traces of the chemical agent sulphur mustard. Furthermore, US intelligence agencies have consistently underestimated IS, which has shown itself to be more capable and innovative than al-Qaeda and has greater financial resources.

According to a senior Iraqi military intelligence officer and two officials from another Iraqi intelligence agency, IS has set up a branch that is tasked with pursuing chemical weapons. While these officials have not provided details of the programme, including how many personnel it is believed to have or its budget, Hakim al-Zimili, the head of the Iraqi parliament’s security and defense committee, citing intelligence reports he has access to, disclosed that the group has managed to attract chemical experts from both abroad as well as Iraqi experts, including ones who once worked for Saddam Hussein’s now-dissolved Military Industrialization Authority. Iraqi intelligence officials have disclosed that the foreigners include experts from Chechnya and southeast Asia. According to Al-Zmili, IS recently moved its research labs, experts and materials from Iraq to “secured locations” inside Syria, adding that the move was apparently out of concern of an eventual assault on Mosul, Iraq’s second largest city, which ws captured by IS in the summer of 2014. Iraqi officials have also expressed their concern that the large safe haven the extremists control since overrunning parts of Iraq and Syria last year has left Iraqi authorities largely in the dark in regards to the IS programme. A senior Iraqi intelligence official has disclosed that “they now have complete freedom to select locations for their labs and production sites and have a wide range of experts, both civilians and military, to aid them.” It is evident that Iraqi authorities fear that the use of chemical weapons could be expanded. Over the summer, Iraq’s military distributed gas masks to troops deployed in the regions west and north of Baghdad. According to a senior officer in the province of Salahuddin, which is located north of Baghdad, 25 percent of the troops deployed there were equipped with masks. More recently, Hakim al-Zamili, the head of the Iraqi parliament’s security and defense committee reported that the country’s military had received from Russia 1,000 protective suits against chemical attacks.

What is known is that developing chemical weapons has been an ambition of the group, and various other jihadi movements, for years. According to two senior officials, in a 2013 report on IS’ weapons procurement efforts, a senior deputy of IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi wrote of “significant progress” toward producing chemical weapons. The officials further disclosed that in the report, Sameer al-Khalifawy wrote that chemical weapons would ensure “Sift victory” and “terrorize our enemies,” adding that what was needed was “to secure a safe environment to carry out experiments.” Al-Khalifawy was killed by rebels in Syria in early 2014, just months before IS overran Mosul and much of northern and Western Iraq. Furthermore in May 2013, Iraqi security forces, acting on a tip from US intelligence officials, raided a secret chemical weapons research lab in Baghdad’s Sunni-majority district of al-Doura. According to Iraqi intelligence officials, security forces arrested two militants running the lab, Kefah Ibrahim al-Jabouri, who held a master’s degree in chemistry, and Abdel Mahmoud al-Abadi, who has a bachelor’s degree in physics and who worked at Saddam’s Military Industrialization Authority before it was disbanded in 2003. Iraqi officials have disclosed that the two men were working with al-Baghdadi, citing IS correspondence that they seized from al-Jabouri. International officials however have disputed these claims, stating that the men were not connected with IS. Iraqi officials have also complained of a lack of cooperation from neighbouring Syria, citing the case of a veteran Iraqi jihadist and weapons expert, Ziad Tareq Ahmed, who fled to Syria after Iraqi security agents raided his home in Baghdad in 2010 and arrested several members of his cell. At the time, Iraqi agents found large amounts of material that could have been used for making mustard gas. Ahmed, who holds a master’s degree in chemistry and who has worked with several Islamic militant groups without formally joining any, was arrested by the Syrians last year. While the Syrian government allowed Iraqi officials to interrogate him in prison, they refused to hand him over. According to Iraqi intelligence officials, last month, Syrian officials released him. One of the officials has since stated that “this is a very grave development, adding that “his release adds significantly to our concerns.”

Suspected Ringleader of Paris Attacks Killed in Raid

French prosecutors disclosed on Thursday that the suspected ringleader behind last week’s deadly attacks in Paris, Abdelhamid Abaaoud, was amongst those killed in a French police raid that occurred in the early morning hours on Wednesday.

Early on Thursday, the Paris prosecutor’s office confirmed that Abaaoud was amongst those killed when anti-terror police raided a flat in the Paris suburb of Saint Denis. The prosecutor’s office has disclosed that his body was found riddled with bullets and shrapnel in a shattered apartment in the northern suburb. Officials however have noted that it still remains unclear whether Abaaoud had blown himself up or not. Abaaoud (28), a Belgian national, was identified from his fingerprints.

On Wednesday, eight people were arrested and at least two killed in the raid, which targeted the property in the Saint Denis district, near the Stade de France stadium. Sources have disclosed that heavily armed police stormed the building after they received a tip-off that Abaaoud was in Paris. A woman at the flat died during the raid after activating a suicide vest. French media have since reported that the woman, named Hasna Aitboulahcen (26), was Abaaoud’s cousin. Aitboulahcen is believed to be the first female suicide bomber in Western Europe. According to reports, the French-Moroccan citizen was born and grew up in Paris. She is understood to have worked at a construction company in the French capital until 2012. According to a witness to the raid, a woman with long, blonde hair, thought to be Aitboulahcen, was seen approaching the window in the apartment about an hour into the siege.  French authorises have indicated that the raid on the flat foiled another attack, which was reportedly planned for the La Defense business quarter of western Paris. The EU’s law enforcement agency, Europol, has warned that further attacks by IS are likely elsewhere in Europe.        

Hours later, French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve disclosed that he had received intelligence that Abaaoud had passed through Greece. He further confirmed that the so-called Islamic State (IS) militant had left for Syria last year, adding that no European Union (EU) states signalled his return. He disclosed that a non-EU state had alerted French officials on Monday that Abaaoud was in Greece. The French minister also implicated Abaaoud in four out of six attacks foiled in France since this spring. The identification of Abaaoud raises serious questions for security services not only in France, but across Europe. Abaaoud was high on both French and Belgian wanted lists and yet he managed to travel from Syria to the heart of Paris without ever leaving a trace.

Investigators are still looking for another suspect, Salah Abdeslam, who is believed to have travelled to Belgium after Friday’s attacks. Earlier on Thursday, Belgian police raided properties linked to Abdeslam and fellow suspected attacker Bilal Hadfi, who was killed on Friday outside the Stade de France stadium. According to Belgian prosecutors, several raids took place in and around Brussels, with Belgian prosecutors reporting that one person has been detained.

On the ground sources have reported that most of the raids in the Belgian capital on Thursday targeted properties in Jette and Molenbeek connected to Bilal Hadfi, a Frenchman who was living in Paris and who was one of the seven attackers killed Friday night. Sources have also reported that a further raid, which targeted an address in the Brussels district of Laeken, was linked to Salah Abdeslam. Speaking to Belgian media, the prosecutor’s office indicated that the raids had been planned for some time and that they are not part of the manhunt. Sources have indicated that Belgian authorities were already investigating Hadfi as he was through to have travelled to Syria.

Meanwhile French Prime Minister Manuel Valls has called for Europe to adopt measures on sharing information about airline passengers as a way of protecting collective security. The call came as France’s lower house of parliament on Thursday voted on a bill to extend the state of emergency, which was declared by President Francois Hollande on Friday for 12 days. The French senate is due to vote on the bill on Friday. The bill includes extending the state of emergency for three months; placing under house arrest anyone deemed to be a public threat; barring suspects from communicating with each other; allowing police to carry out searches at any time, without the prior approval of a judge, if the public is believed to be in danger. Furthermore, under a police directive that was issued to coincide with the state of emergency, French police officers will be allowed to carry their weapons while off duty as long as they wear an armband to identify them. Paris police have extended their ban on gatherings and demonstrations until midnight on Sunday, however they will be allowed at the various sites that were attacked last Friday.