IS leaders ordered Paris, Brussels attacks, prosecutor says

Terrorist attacks in France and Belgium carried out by the same cell; authorities still searching for suspects

By AFP 9 November 2016, 7:16 pm

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Rescue workers tend to victims of a jihadi terror attack in the 10th district of Paris, November 13, 2015. (AP Photo/Jacques Brinon, File)

BRUSSELS — The jihadist cell that launched deadly attacks on Paris and Brussels received its orders from “very high” in the Islamic State group command, Belgium’s federal prosecutor said Wednesday.

“We know that the orders came from the Islamic State zone…. We know that it went very high in the command,” Frederic Van Leeuw said in an interview with AFP.

He could not say exactly which top IS official or officials gave the orders or whether they sent them from a base in Syria or Iraq, the territory run by IS leader and self-declared caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

He said the command moved around to dodge US-backed strikes. “Baghdadi was for a while in Mosul, sometimes in Raqqa,” he added.

“We don’t know at all who are the people who really gave the orders,” he said.

A picture taken off CCTV purporting to show suspects in the Brussels airport attack on March 22, 2016. Faycal C may be the man on the right, sources told AFP on March 26, 2016 (Twitter) — A picture taken off CCTV purporting to show suspects in the Brussels airport attack on March 22, 2016. (Twitter)

Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attacks across Paris on November 13 that killed 130 people as well as the suicide bombings at Brussels airport and a metro station on March 22 that killed 32 people.

Van Leeuw said the attacks were carried out by the same cell, some of whose members were based in Brussels, and the authorities are still looking for suspects who did not die in the attacks or were arrested afterward.

“The investigation is far from having ended, as much at the Belgian as at the French level,” he said.