Investigators have determined that “the terrorist group initially had the intention to strike in France again”, the Belgian prosecutor’s office said in a statement on Sunday.
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(CNN)The third suspect in the Brussels Airport attack – the “man in the hat” – has been positively identified as Mohamed Abrini, according to the Belgian federal prosecutor’s office.
Abrini confessed he was the “man in the hat” who appeared next to the two suicide bombers at Brussels airport, Belgian prosecutors said Saturday.
Three other suspects charged were Herve BM, Bilal EM and Osama K whose full name is Osama Krayem.
Candles are seen near a message, “Brussels, We Stand With You”, at a street memorial at the Place de la Bourse to victims of March’s bomb attack.
He was arrested one day after authorities released several videos of the suspect and appealed to the public for information on his whereabouts.
Khalid el-Bakraoui, 27, who blew himself up on the Brussels metro shortly after his elder brother Ibrahim had detonated a suicide vest at Brussels airport, was suspected of playing some kind of logistics role in the Paris attacks. Prosecutors believe he was driven from Germany to Belgium by Paris attacks suspect Salah Abdeslam in October.
On March 22, two suicide bombers detonated explosives at Brussels airport and Maelbeek subway station, killing 32 people and injuring dozens of others.
Despite the arrests and charges, Brussels remains under the second-highest terror alert, meaning an attack is still considered likely.
Terrorists who attacked the Belgian capital last month initially planned to strike again in France, but changed their minds as investigators closed in, authorities said Sunday.
Abrini was already the object of a massive European manhunt following the November 13 terror attacks in Paris that left 130 people dead.
Jan Jambon, the country’s interior minister, warned Saturday there “are perhaps other cells that are still active on our territory”.
Abrini is thought to have been filmed at a petrol station with Abdeslam two days before the attacks in Paris in November. Teri reports that Belgium has kept its threat level at three out of four, which puts the threat of an attack at “credible and possible”. He also had ties to Abdelhamid Abbaoud, the Paris attackers’ ringleader, who was killed by the French police in a raid later.
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The developments Saturday were rare successes for Belgian authorities, who have been pilloried for mishandling leads in the bombings investigation.
