Abdelhamid Abaaoud the Belgian jihadi suspected of masterminding deadly attacks in Paris
PARIS, France (AFP) – The Islamic State jihadist suspected of masterminding the Paris attacks was killed during a major police raid, prosecutors confirmed yesterday, as French lawmakers voted to extend a state of emergency imposed after the carnage.
Abdelhamid Abaaoud was killed in Wednesday’s assault by elite police units on an apartment in northern Paris, which left at least two people dead.
Handprint analysis was used to identify the Belgian’s body, which was found among the rubble of the shattered building after officers rained fire and grenades on the jihadists in a seven-hour siege.
“Abdelhamid Abaaoud has just been formally identified … as having been killed during the raid” the Paris prosecutor’s office said in a statement.
Prime Minister Manuel Valls said he welcomed the death of “one of the masterminds” of the attacks.
The raid in Saint-Denis had stopped a “new team of terrorists” who were ready to launch another attack in a city still mourning 129 dead, Prosecutor Francois Molins said Wednesday.
Valls warned of the dangers still faced by France as lawmakers voted on extending an extraordinary package of security measures for three months.
“We must not rule anything out. There is also the risk from chemical or biological weapons,” Valls said.
He called on France’s European Union partners to urgently adopt measures to share airline passenger information.
The decision by lawmakers yesterday means the state of emergency will be in place for three months from November 26.
The measures include allowing police to carry weapons when they are off duty and use them in the event of an attack — providing they wear a police armband to avoid “any confusion”, according to a directive seen by AFP.
French MPs also voted to allow the government to block websites and social media under the state of emergency.
As the Paris probe widened to countries across Europe, Belgian police staged six raids in the Brussels area linked to a suicide bomber who blew himself up outside the French stadium, prosecutors said.
Italy was also hunting five suspects after an FBI tip-off about possible jihadist attacks on landmark sites including St Peter’s cathedral in the Vatican, the foreign minister said.
Eight suspects were arrested in the massive Saint-Denis raid which killed Abaaoud, but another key suspect, Salah Abdeslam, remains unaccounted for.
US intelligence meanwhile published a report showing it warned in May that IS was capable of carrying out the kind of large-scale coordinated attacks seen in Paris.
IS has also released a new video threatening New York, and specifically Times Square, although police said there was no “current and specific” threat.