Manhunt intensifies in France
Police seek �dangerous� Abdeslam Salah; death toll rises to 132
Agencies
A manhunt intensified yesterday for one or more fugitives who vanished following the murderous mayhem that swept across the city Friday night, leaving 132 people dead, hundreds injured and residents anxious and concerned that killers remained among them, report agencies from Paris. A wanted alert and photo was issued for Salah Abdeslam, 26, a Brussels native and brother of one of seven terrorists who died in Fridays attacks. Another brother was arrested in Belgium after the attacks, authorities said. Police warned Abdeslam is dangerous, do not approach yourself. It is now known that at least three French suicide bombers were involved in the deadly attacks, the city prosecutor yesterday told AFP.
Two of them were living in the Belgian capital Brussels, Paris prosecutor Francois Molins said in a statement. He said one of them was a 20-year-old man who blew himself up near to the French national stadium, while the second, a 31-year-old man, detonated his explosives belt at a bar on the bustling Boulevard Voltaire.
Police had on Saturday identified the first of the attackers, naming him as 29-year-old Paris native Omar Ismail Mostefai and saying he was involved in the attack on the Bataclan music venue where 89 people were killed. Mostefai, whose identity was confirmed using a severed fingertip, was known to the intelligence services as someone close to radical Islam, but he had never been linked to terrorism. The city was on edge despite a strong police and military presence. A crowd gathered Sunday evening at Republique Plaza near a large, impromptu memorial scattered in panic after firecrackers apparently were ignited nearby, police said.
Security concerns were founded. Earlier Sunday, several Kalashnikov rifles believed to have been used by the attackers were found in an abandoned car in the Montreuil neighborhood in eastern Paris, police said. The discovery fueled unease that one or more of the attackers remained loose in the vast city.
Also Sunday, a French judicial official said the father, brother and other family members of suicide bomber Omar Ismael Mostefai the only terrorist to be publicly identified by authorities were detained and were being questioned, French media reported. Meanwhile, US President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed on Sunday on the need for UN-sponsored peace talks and a ceasefire to resolve years of war in Syria. The two leaders spoke during a short and unannounced summit meeting over a coffee table on the margins of a G20 summit in the Turkish resort of Antalya. President Obama and President Putin agreed on the need for a Syrian-led and Syrian-owned political transition, which would be preceded by UN-mediated negotiations between the Syrian opposition and regime as well a ceasefire, the official told reporters after the meeting.
The two held a constructive discussion that lasted about 35 minutes, the official added, calling the need for a solution for Syria an imperative made all the more urgent by the horrifying terrorist attacks in Paris. The official, who wished to remain anonymous, said Obama welcomed efforts by all nations to confront Islamic State jihadists in Syria amid Western suspicions that Russias intervention is really aimed at propping up Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. A top Kremlin official said that while Moscow and Washington shared strategic objectives to fight Islamic State, divergences still existed. Differences on tactics still remain, Putins foreign policy advisor Yuri Ushakov told reporters on the sidelines of the summit. Obama also offered his deep condolences for the loss of Russian life in the bombing of a Metrojet passenger flight in Egypt killing all 224 people on board in Russias worst air disaster.
