Terrorist linked to Paris attack gets 20 years for trying to kill police in Brussels shoot-out
SALAH ABDESLAM, once Europe’s most wanted man and the sole surviving suspect of the Paris terror attacks, yesterday was jailed for 20 years for terrorism-related attempted murder in a shoot-out with Belgian police.
Neither Abdeslam, 28, or Sofiane Ayari, 24, his co-accused, were in the Palais de Justice courtroom in Brussels to hear the verdict over the March 2016 gun battle, which left four officers wounded and one jihadist dead.
The Belgian-born French national was in prison in France where he is awaiting trial for his alleged role in the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) attack on Paris in November 2015, which killed 130 people.
In its judgment, the court in the Belgian capital said “there can be no doubt” over Abdeslam and Ayari’s involvement in extremism. Ayari, who is being held in a Belgian prison, was also sentenced to 20 years.
Acting on a tip-off over the Paris attacks, police had raided a flat in a suburb of Brussels – 34 shots were fired before Abdeslam escaped.
Investigators say his arrest three days later in the largely immigrant area of Molenbeek, in the Belgian capital, spurred the Brussels bombers to bring forward the 2016 attacks. On March 22, suicide bombers from a cell linked to the Paris attacks killed 32 people and wounded hundreds more at Brussels airport and a metro station.
At an earlier hearing in Brussels, Abdeslam vowed not to answer any questions saying European courts were prejudiced against Muslims before adding that he was “not afraid”. He refused to attend any further hearings.