Telephone communications on a wiretap by French and Belgian security agencies indicated a woman at the third-floor apartment was Abaaoud’s cousin, a Belgian counterterrorism official told CNN.
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The Belgian jihadi suspected of being the ringleader of the Paris terrorist attacks was killed during a raid on a suburban apartment, officials said Thursday.
It said he was identified based on “skin samples” – that’s been interpreted by the BBC as fingerprints, but that may be a mistranslation.
Abaaoud is also believed to have links to previous foiled terror attacks in France, including one on a Paris-bound high-speed train that was thwarted when passengers overpowered a gunman in August.
At least two suspects died in the raid, one male and one woman who detonated her suicide vest. Bilal Hadfi was one of the suicide bombers who struck outside the Stade de France, according to several sources.
“It was the body we had discovered in the building, riddled with bullets”. The target of the raid was a Belgian Islamic State member, Abdelhamid Abaaoud, accused of masterminding the carnage, but it’s still unclear whether he has been found. The officials all spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not permitted to divulge details of the investigation.
NPR’s Dina Temple-Raston reports that authorities say they don’t know if Salah Abdeslam, whom police say was a key operative in the attacks, was also killed in the raid.
Paris prosecutor Francois Molins said a probe into the attacks allowed police “to obtain telephonic surveillance and witness testimony which led us to believe that Abaaoud was likely to be in an… apartment in Saint-Denis”.
Investigators believe the attacks – the worst atrocity in France since World War Two – were set in motion in Syria, with Islamist cells in neighbouring Belgium organising the mayhem. He said they plan to spend another 400 million Euros, about $427 million, to fight terrorism.
Confirmation of Abaaoud’s death came as authorities launched six raids in Brussels, including in the impoverished Molenbeek neighborhood where Abaaoud grew up, a spokesman for Belgium’s federal prosecutor told NBC News.
The perpetrators of Friday’s Paris attacks who have thus far been identified were French citizens. “The reality of what happened in Mumbai then has now arrived in Europe”, Wainwright said.
Seven militants were killed or blew themselves up in the attacks on the stadium, a concert hall, bars and restaurants that were claimed by the Islamic State group operating in Iraq and Syria.
Five thousand rounds of ammunition were used by police during the seven hour siege in Saint-Denis.
Obama on Thursday reiterated the US position that eradicating the group was tied up with ending the civil war in Syria, which could not happen as long as President Bashar al-Assad was in power.
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France’s National Assembly approved President Hollande’s request to extend the state of emergency in the country by three months.
