adminFrench police continued the search on Friday for a suspect on the run one week since the Paris attacks after it was announced the alleged planner was killed in a raid.
French police are still looking for Salah Abdeslam, 26, after the attacks that killed 129 people and wounded at least 350 others.
Prime Minister Manuel Valls said France does not know if Abdeslam is in France or Belgium, or if more groups involved with the gunmen are still at large.
“The threat is there. We don’t know at this point in the investigation if there are groups, individuals, who are directly linked to the attack on Friday evening,” Valls told France 2 television. “We don’t know yet one can imagine. That’s why the threat is still there.”
Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the alleged architect of the atrocity, was killed in a police raid in the Saint-Denis area, the Paris prosecutor announced on Thursday.
“Abdelhamid Abaaoud has just been formally identified . . . as having been killed during the raid” in the northern Paris suburb on Wednesday, Francois Molins said in a statement.
The confirmation of his death followed fingerprint analysis, Molins added.
Abaaoud, a 27-year-old Belgian national of Moroccan origin, allegedly orchestrated the attacks claimed by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).
Three police officials said a woman who died in the raid was Abaaoud’s cousin. One said Hasna Aitboulahcen, 26, is believed to have detonated a suicide vest after a brief conversation with police officers.
The official confirmed an audio recording, punctuated by gunshots, in which an officer asked: “Where is your boyfriend?” and she responded: “He’s not my boyfriend.” Then loud bangs are heard.
The exact relationship between Abaaoud, whose body was reportedly riddled with wounds, and Aitboulahcen was not clear.
Bernard Cazeneuve, the French interior minister, said Abaaoud had been involved in at least four previous foiled attacks, including an incident in August when a gunman tried to kill passengers on a high-speed train between Amsterdam and Paris.
“[The cases] would have all involved attacks perpetrated by European jihadists sent to France… Europe must coordinate itself and defend itself against this threat,” Cazeneuve said, calling for a more effective arms strategy on the continent. “The fight against terrorism is crucial.”
Elsewhere, Belgian police arrested nine people in Brussels — seven of them linked to French national stadium bomber Bilal Hadfi — during nine raids connected to the Paris attacks, the federal prosecutor’s office said. — AP
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