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SUNDAY, MARCH 20, 2016 INTERNATIONAL Paris attacks ex-fugitive a mystery man: Chameleon or coward PARIS: Beardless, with short-cropped months through an international caught Friday in the neighborhood tice,” he said. “You have to understand said recently. Abdeslam was registered hair and a mild manner, Salah dragnet. where he grew up - remains perhaps that we have a family, we have a mom in the Schengen information system Abdeslam slipped from one world to The fugitive who evaded several the biggest mystery among the and he remains her child.” on suspicion of unidentified criminal another as easily as he slipped for four close calls with police - until he was cohort of men who brazenly attacked Brothers Brahim and Salah ran a activity. But when he was stopped four Paris cafes and restaurants, a noted family cafe in Molenbeek - which days before the attacks at a routine concert hall and France’s main sports police closed down not long before traffic check as he drove and two com- stadium on Nov. 13, killing 130 peo- the attacks on suspicion of drug deal- panions drove from Germany to ple. He is thought to have served as ing there. The cafe served alcohol, for- Austria, the group was waved on their the logistics man, renting rooms, bidden in the Muslim religion, but way after saying they were heading to shopping for detonators and driving that clearly posed no problem for the Vienna for a vacation. at least one of the killers from Brussels two young men. Just like the partying Abdeslam clearly slipped from role to Paris. It remains unclear whether he that Brahim’s friends told The to role with ease, seamlessly orches- was meant to become an attacker Associated Press their friend did, and trating transitions from regular neigh- himself, as a suicide bomber, and reports said Salah did, too. borhood guy to the logistician behind whether he was a chameleon or a But since the attacks, Abdeslam was the Muslim extremist attacks. But he coward. a man on the run who left a trail of may have missed a beat. A suicide vest Abdeslam, 26, is a French citizen unanswered questions in his wake and was found near where his cell phone who lived in the Molenbeek neighbor- shown by his absence that he could was last detected in Montrouge - hood of Brussels, the low-income outwit the biggest manhunt in Europe. where he awaited a rescue by friends. quarter of mainly Moroccan immi- Abdeslam strangely called his con- And the Clio he drove to Paris with grant families and home to most of tacts in Brussels to come to Paris and some attackers was found abandoned the at least nine attackers. fetch him after the attacks, apparently in northern Paris, in a district the He lost one of his two brothers, stranded in a southern suburb of the Islamic State group said in its claim of Brahim, who blew himself up, and his French capital. On their return the fol- responsibility that an attack had childhood friend Abdelhamid lowing day, the group managed to get occurred. It never did. Abaaoud, the suspected ringleader of through a police checkpoint after a In January, the Islamic State group the bloodbath. standard stop. Some Belgian media published an online photo tribute to Four days after the attacks, reported that Abdeslam was smuggled the extremists who killed in Paris. But Mohamed Abdeslam, the third broth- out of a house in Molenbeek two days someone was missing from the photo BRUSSELS: Armed police officers escort Salah Abdeslam to a police vehi- er, said the three siblings grew up nor- after the attacks under the noses of display of in Dabiq, the IS propaganda cle during a raid in the Molenbeek neighborhood of Brussels, Belgium mally, seemingly content with life in police - a report never proven. “All we magazine: Abdeslam. Belgian jihadi on Friday March 18, 2016. The identity of Salah Abdeslam is confirmed Europe. know is that when we came, he wasn’t watcher Pieter van Ostaeyen said this yesterday, by French police and deputy mayor of Molenbeek, Ahmed El “We are an open-minded family. there,” may be due to IS’s desire to honor only Khannouss quoting official Belgium police sources. —AP We never had any problems with jus- Belgian prosecutor Eric Van der Sypt those extremists slain as martyrs. —AP Interpol urges ‘extra vigilance’ at borders British captive appears in new IS video LYON: Interpol yesterday urged “extra vigilance at The database “holds details of some 250,000 installment in a series of propaganda videos border controls” the day after the arrest of top stolen and lost Syrian and Iraqi passports, of released by IS, Cantlie speaks to the camera in the Paris attacks fugitive Salah Abdeslam in Belgium. which more than 190,000 were reported stolen as style of a news report. It is unclear when it was “The capture of the 26-year-old Belgian-born blank,” Interpol said. “Whilst it is too soon to spec- shot, but Cantlie last appeared in an IS video in French national... may encourage any accom- ulate in which direction the investigation will pro- early 2015. In yesterday’s video, a gaunt-looking plices to attempt to flee Europe, or elsewhere,” the ceed, anyone linked to Abdeslam will be con- Cantlie says he is in Mosul, IS’ main city in north- world police body warned its 190 member coun- cerned that their location could be revealed and ern Iraq. tries. In a statement, Interpol drew particular attempt to run to try and avoid detection,” said Dressed in black and squinting in the sunshine, attention to a blank Syrian passport that was Interpol Secretary General Juergen Stock. he is seen standing in front of a metal shack he found outside the Stade de France stadium, one “Belgium is to be congratulated on the arrest of describes as a media kiosk that distributes IS pam- of the targets of the November 13 attacks that Salah Abdeslam, but this is just one piece in a phlets, which was destroyed in an air strike by a The arrest of Salah Abdeslam, the last major suspect wanted in connection with claimed 130 lives. larger puzzle,” he said. Interpol said its global US-led coalition. Speaking in English with Arabic the November jihadist attacks in Paris, has dealt a “major blow” to the Islamic The body based in Lyon, France, said the pass- database on “foreign terrorist fighters” contains subtitles, as in previous clips of the same style, port had been recorded in Interpol’s Stolen and information on some 6,000 individuals provided Cantlie criticizes and derides the US-led campaign State group in Europe, French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said. —AFP Lost Travel Documents (SLTD) database in April by more than 50 countries. launched in 2014 against IS. He was kidnapped 2014, adding that it was part of a batch of 1,452 along with journalist James Foley in November stolen blank passports. “An advisory sent to all New IS video 2012 in Syria while covering the war there. Foley Penpix of Paris member countries... recommends enhanced In another development, British journalist then became the first of several hostages to be checks at control points, particularly against” the John Cantlie, who is being held prisoner by the slain by the jihadists. Media rights watchdog SLTD database, it said. The SLTD was created in Islamic State group, appeared in a new video Reporters Without Borders has condemned IS for 2002 after the September 11 attacks in the United released yesterday supposedly filmed in the its “cowardly” use of a hostage in a forced role to terror suspects States. jihadists’ Iraqi stronghold of Mosul. In the latest push the jihadists’ propaganda. —Agencies BRUSSELS: Top Paris attacks fugitive Salah investigators say Belkaid “more than likely” Abdeslam, arrested on Friday in a police raid in used the alias Samir Bouzid. the gritty Brussels district of Molenbeek, was Greece scrambles to execute one of the most wanted men in Europe. 11 charged in Belgium Another two suspects are still on the run, while Mohammed Amri, 27, and Hamza Attou, 21, 11 people have been charged in connection brought Abdeslam back to Belgium several EU-Turkey migrant deal with the November 13 assaults in the French hours after the Paris attacks. Lazez Abraimi, a 39- capital that claimed 130 lives. Three others are year-old Moroccan living in the Brussels region, behind bars elsewhere. Here is a summary of was arrested after traces of blood and two hand- ATHENS: Greece scrambled yes- earlier in the week. calls for the EU to resettle one full rights of appeal and proper the main suspects: guns were found in his car. Ali Oulkadi, a 31- terday to begin the massive task With over 40,000 migrants refugee directly from Turkey. “This oversight. Tsipras also insisted that year-old French national, drove Abdeslam of implementing an historic EU- already in Greece, the debt-hit is a Herculean task facing us,” human rights would be respected. The latest capture through Brussels the day after the attacks and Turkey migrant deal aimed at country could not take on this new European Commission chief Jean- “We will not make any conces- Salah Abdeslam, 26, a Belgian-born French dropped him off at a safe house used as a work- stemming the flow of refugees task without major assistance from Claude Juncker has said. In total sions” in that area, he said. national, is believed to have played a key logisti- shop for manufacturing of explosive belts. fleeing war and conflict in the its European partners, including some 4,000 border officials and The United States called the cal role in the attacks, and fled across the border Abdeilah Chouaa, 30: His name was discovered Middle East.

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