The suspected ringleader of the November 13 terrorist attacks in Paris reportedly dodged the Athens, Greece, police 10 months earlier, the BBC reported Tuesday.
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The operation, in Athens in January – before the attacks in Paris – came after it was allegedly discovered that Abaaoud had been directing a terror cell in Belgium from Greece.
He was targeted in an anti-terror operation that fell through before raids were carried out in Verviers, Belgium, in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo attacks in January, according to a Belgian anti-terrorism source.
The Greek operation was supposed to have taken place before the one carried out by security forces in Verviers, eastern Belgium, on 15 January.
Greek authorities were on Abaaoud’s trail, believing he was running the Belgian terror cell by phone, but were too late. While they were able to extract DNA evidence from both flats that was eventually linked to Abaaoud, they could not catch him.
Hundreds of French and Belgian police are still working closely to piece together exactly who was responsible for the horrendous attacks.
Abdelhamid Abaaoud had been implicated in four out of six foiled attacks since this spring in France and sentenced to 20 years in prison in absentia, French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve has said.
It’s also known that Salah Abdeslam, a Paris attacker who remains on the run, had travelled to Greece in August where he stayed for three days. Abdeslam is now believed to have possibly escaped to Syria, a source close to the investigation and a counterterrorism source told CNN last week.
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Prosecutor François Molins said the Abdeslam rented one of the cars used in the attacks and drove suicide bombers to the Stade de France, where they blew themselves up.
