Paris attacks suspect ‘voluntarily refused’ to blow himself up
Salah Abdeslam says he ‘luckily’ couldn’t follow through with planned suicide bombing along with other IS jihadists in French capital, denies Brussels link
The suspected ringleader of the Paris attacks, Salah Abdeslam, “voluntarily refused” to detonate his suicide vest during the wave of killings in the French capital late last year, his brother said on Friday.
Mohamed Abdeslam said his brother “voluntarily refused to blow himself up” along with the other Islamic State jihadists who killed 130 people in gun and suicide bomb attacks on November 13, according to Belgian media chain BFMTV.
“If I wanted, there would have been more victims,” Salah Abdeslam told his brother from prison in northern Belgium, according to the news channel.
“Luckily, I did not follow through,” his brother said he told him.
Salah Abdeslam, the sole surviving suspect in the November attacks in Paris, was arrested in Brussels on March 18 after four months on the run as Europe’s most wanted man.
He is believed to have acted as a logistics coordinator and told investigators he was meant to carry out a suicide bombing at the Stade de France stadium, but backed out.
Four days after he was arrested, the Belgian capital was struck by IS bombings at the airport and a metro station carried out by jihadists with links to the Paris attacks cell. At least 30 people were killed in the coordinated attacks.
The 26-year-old, who is about to be extradited to France, apparently told his brother he wants to cooperate with investigators, but denied any role in the Brussels bombings.
Abdeslam’s lawyer said earlier this week that his client agreed to be transferred to France under a European arrest warrant, clearing the way for a fast-track extradition.
Abdeslam’s arrest was considered a rare success in Belgium’s anti-terror fight, although he was found just meters from his family home.
French President Francois Hollande announced immediately after Abdeslam’s arrest that he wanted him returned to France as quickly as possible to face justice over the attacks.
Close links have emerged between the Paris and Brussels attackers, exposing a tangled web of cross-border extremist cells and triggering a series of raids and arrests in several European countries.
Abdeslam has connections to at least two of the Brussels bombers. Khalid El Bakraoui, who blew himself up at the metro, rented a flat in Brussels where Abdeslam’s fingerprints were found.
One of the two airport bombers, Najim Laachraoui, once drove to Hungary with Abdeslam.
Belgium is still searching for a suspected third attacker, the so-called “man in the hat” seen in surveillance images alongside the two airport bombers.
With no suspects in custody over the attacks, police on Thursday appealed for CCTV footage from members of the public.
