The belt looks like those used by the other attackers and also contains bolts and triacetone triperoxide (TATP), the homemade explosive that seven of the murderers detonated to kill themselves, police said.
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Of the 21 people detained, one was formally charged with participating in the Paris terrorist attacks, the prosecutor’s office in Belgium said today.
A suspicious object resembling a suicide belt has been found in Montrouge, a commune in the southern Parisian suburbs.
French investigators initially believed Abdeslam had been in a black Seat Leon vehicle that was used in the shootings at restaurants and cafes in the 10th and 11th districts of the capital.
Belgian authorities have not announced any details of their investigation into potential attacks nor have they released any information about four suspects who have been arrested and charged with terrorism-related offences.
A source close to the inquiry said telephone data placed Salah Abdeslam, a key suspect in the attacks who is believed to still be on the run, in the Montrouge area on the night of the attacks.
As authorities tried to establish Abdeslam’s movements and whereabouts, a source said he travelled through Italy in August with a companion, but his presence caused no alarm because he was not a wanted man at the time.
Twenty-one people were detained last night alone as the investigation into the attacks rumbles on, but detectives appear to be no nearer to locating Abdelsalam.
“We are still confronted with the threat we were facing yesterday”, Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel told a news conference.
Belgium’s crisis centre said the alert level would only change if a significant breakthrough warranted it.
“We are very alert and call for caution”, Mr Michel said.
An armed soldier stands guard over Stadhuis Van Brussel in Grote Markt in Brussels, Belgium, where security has been tightened in the nation’s capital.
Terror gripped a Paris neighbourhood overnight in fresh anti-terror raids. France has already carried out strikes against IS targets in Syria.
France has extended a state of emergency which allows police raids, searches and house arrest without permission from a judge, for three months.
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Abdeslam, 26, fled the massacre which claimed 130 lives last week rather than blowing himself up like a few of the other attackers.
