[NEWS] PARIS PROSECUTORS: POLICE ATTACK SUSPECT ADHERED TO 'RADICAL VISION OF ISLAM'
The man suspected of a deadly knife attack
at the police headquarters in Paris was in contact with conservative Islamic
Salafists, the lead prosecutor has said. The suspect had worked for the Paris
police since 2003. A staffer at Paris police headquarters who killed four
colleagues in a knife attack on Thursday seemed to have believed in "a
radical vision of Islam," anti-terror prosecutor Jean-Francois Ricard said
Saturday.
The assailant, a 45-year-old civilian
computer expert who converted to Islam about 10 years ago, was in contact with
members of the Salafist Islamist movement, Ricard told reporters. Police Chief
Didier Lallement said on Friday that the attacker, like everyone in the
intelligence division, had received a high level of security screening. He had
worked for the Paris police force since 2003 did not have a history of
psychiatric problems.
'Extreme violence'
Ricard said the autopsies "attest to a
scene of extreme violence" in an attack that lasted seven minutes, adding
that the two knives used in the attack had been purchased by the killer. The
man "agreed with certain atrocities committed in the name of [Islam]"
and defended the Charlie Hebdo attacks in 2015, Ricard said. The suspect, who
was shot dead in a confrontation with police, exchanged 33 text messages with
his wife ahead of the attacks, all of which were of a religious character,
Ricard said. The suspect's wife is in police custody until Monday. Officials
have not officially said there was a terrorist motive behind the attack, but handing
a case to anti-terrorism prosecutors usually indicates a terrorism link is the
focus of inquiries. Ricard said his office had taken over the probe because of
signs the crime was premeditated, the attacker's desire to die and the nature
of injuries found on at least one of the victims.
.
Opposition parties call for parliamentary
inquiry Prime Minister Edouard Philippe told weekly
newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche he had ordered inspectors to review the
procedures in place in the intelligence department of the police headquarters
and anti-terror intelligence unit to detect signs of radicalization among civil
servants. Philippe also defended Interior Minister Christophe Castaner, who has
come under attack from French opposition parties, including the far-right
National Rally and the center-right Les Republicains. They have called for a
parliamentary inquiry into the knife attack, alleging that Castaner had
withheld information in the case. Eric Ciotti of Les Republicains wrote on
Twitter that the interior minister had withheld information about the possible
radicalization of the Paris police employee. "Why was he still in the
police's service, what confidential access did he have? A commission of inquiry
must clarify the state of affairs," Ciotti said on Twitter. "I am
confident in Christophe Castaner, who expressed what he knew at the moment when
he spoke," Phillipe was quoted as saying on Saturday. France suffered
Islamist terrorist attacks in 2015 and 2016 that killed 237 people.
.
Full
news: AFP, Reuters – 05 Oct 2019
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