AFP, PARIS: Prime Minister Manuel Valls warned Thursday of the danger of an attack in France using “chemical or biological weapons”, in a speech to lawmakers debating the extension of a state of emergency. “We must not rule anything out,” Valls said. “There is also the risk from chemical or biological weapons,” he added. As the investigation spreads across Europe into the attacks claimed by the Islamic State group, Valls also called on the European Union (EU) to urgently adopt measures to share airline passenger information.
“More than ever, it’s time for Europe to adopt the text... to guarantee the traceability of movements, including within the union. It’s a condition of our collective security,” he said. Meanwhile, police in France are going to be allowed to carry weapons when they are off duty, according to a directive from police commanders issued Thursday. They will be allowed to use their guns in the event of a terror attack providing they wear a police armband to avoid “any confusion”, according to the note seen by AFP says.
At least 129 people were killed in shootings and suicide bombings in the French capital on Friday, targeting a concert hall, bars and restaurants and the Stade de France national stadium. Meanwhile, Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel on Thursday rejected criticism of his country’s security services over the Paris attacks, saying Belgian intelligence led to a huge raid in France targeting the suspected mastermind. “I do not accept the criticisms which were aimed at denigrating the work of our security services,” Michel said in a speech to parliament in which he unveiled new security measures. “Yesterday, in Saint-Denis (in Paris) an attack was prevented thanks in particular to intelligence provided by Belgian teams,” the prime minister added. French police staged a ferocious seven-hour assault in Saint-Denis on Wednesday after intelligence led investigators to an apartment where the Belgian suspected of orchestrating the worst ever terror attack on French soil was thought to be hiding. “I want to thank our magistrates, our police officers, our intelligence services for their courage and mobilisation,” Michel said. “Thanks to them lives have been saved”.
French President Francois Hollande has said that the attacks were “planned in Syria, prepared and organised in Belgium.” The most notorious jihadist connected to Brussels is Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the alleged mastermind of the Paris attacks, who grew up in the Molenbeek district before going to join the Islamic State group in Syria.
He escaped a raid on a terror cell in Belgium in January which killed two other Islamists but French officials said he was targeted in an operation in Paris on Wednesday. Meanwhile Molenbeek native Brahim Abdesalam, who blew himself up in front of a cafe in Paris on Friday, and his brother Salah, who is wanted by French authorities over the attacks, were well known to Belgian authorities for radicalism and for running a bar in Molenbeek used by drug dealers to sell and smoke pot.This year the two were questioned by police on their radical activities, but released without charge and without a report to French authorities.