The possible accomplice
French security services have identified a suspected accomplice in that attack, according to the French newspaper Le Parisien.
Police
sources cited by the newspaper said one line of investigation is that
the accomplice, a man from a Paris suburb, may have driven gunman Amedy
Coulibaly to the kosher supermarket, where Coulibaly later shot dead
four people.
Coulibaly
was killed in a police raid to end the siege. The Kouachi brothers also
are dead. But investigators' efforts to track down possible suspects
tied to last week's attacks are continuing.
Le
Parisien's report said investigators identified Coulibaly's suspected
accomplice using keys for a motorbike discovered in an apartment they
raided over the weekend.
Neighbors told CNN the apartment, in the Paris suburb of Gentilly, was raided Saturday by police.
Also found inside the apartment, according to Le Parisien: a stash of weapons, explosives and two ISIS flags.
Coulibaly purportedly told authorities before he was killed that he belonged to ISIS.
Police
also think the suspected accomplice may have been responsible for
shooting and wounding a jogger last week -- an attack that the Paris
prosecutor has said could be tied to Coulibaly because the ammunition
used was the same as ammunition found at the scene of the kosher market
attack, Le Parisien said.
Paris police would not comment to CNN on the contents of the report.
Le Parisien says Coulibaly's suspected accomplice, whom the newspaper did not name, may have fled France, possibly for Syria.
Officials
have also said they believe Hayat Boumeddiene, Coulibaly's widow, may
have played a role in the attacks and has fled to Syria.
The arms connection
Belgian
federal prosecutors told CNN on Thursday that a man is under arrest in
Charleroi in connection with arms trafficking. They said he recently
bought a car from Boumeddiene.
Prosecutors said the man was "known to police" but couldn't be directly linked to Coulibaly.
According
to Belgian media, the man went to police after learning about last
week's shootings. They then searched his house and found documents that
matched the type of gun Coulibaly used in Paris.
CNN
has not been able to independently confirm the details of the raid on
the man's home or the documents found, after contacting police.
The money trail
U.S.
officials have told CNN it's believed that when Cherif Kouachi traveled
to Yemen in 2011, he returned carrying money from AQAP earmarked to
carry out the attack. Investigators said the terrorist group could have
given as much as $20,000, but the exact amount has not been verified.
French
newspaper La Voix du Nord reports that Coulibaly also secured funds
that may have been used in the attack on the kosher supermarket.
He got the loan for $7,000 (6,000 euros) from the Cofidis Bank in Villeneuve d'Ascq, in northern France.
The
paper reported the amount that Coulibaly borrowed was not high enough
to require an explanation of how the money would be spent. He took out
the loan in December.
Obama and Cameron
U.S.
President Barack Obama and UK Prime Minister David Cameron are expected
to discuss the Paris attacks when they meet Thursday and Friday in
Washington.
The two leaders pledged to safeguard "our way of life" in a jointly written opinion piece for the Times of London.
"We will continue to stand together against those who threaten our values and our way of life," they said in Thursday's edition.
"Along
with our French allies, we have made clear to those who think they can
muzzle freedom of speech and expression with violence that our voices
will only grow louder."
More terror cases
With
France on its highest level of alert, 10,000 troops have deployed
across the country. Thousands of police officers are on patrol,
including hundreds assigned to protect Jewish schools.
Since
the attacks, dozens of cases have been opened in France against people
accused of expressing support for terrorism since the attacks, the
Justice Ministry said.
It's unclear how
many people are blamed for the 54 infractions. The cases include
investigations involving phone threats, cyberattacks and Facebook posts,
the ministry said.
Some are in prison
awaiting trial, some have already been convicted, and some have been
released with a notice of a court date, ministry spokesman Pierre Rance
said. Penalties for the alleged crimes vary, he said.
Justice
Minister Christiane Taubira "considers that words or actions of a
racist or anti-Semitic nature, or that cause hateful, violent, or
discriminatory behavior, or advocate terrorism, or target security
forces must be fought and pursued with the utmost vigor," her office
said in a statement.
She "asked
prosecutors to exercise extreme reactivity in the conduct of public
action against the perpetrators of such crimes," the statement said.
Paris on edge
CNN
affiliate BFMTV on Thursday reported a scare outside the Elysee Palace,
the official residence of French President Francois Hollande.
A
car drove the wrong way up a one-way street and struck a police
officer, who was taken to a hospital with minor injuries. The driver had
been drinking, authorities say.
Police
don't believe it has anything to do with the terror attacks, and
Hollande was not at the palace at the time of the incident.
No comments:
Post a Comment