Shock over attack:

Europe

Al Baghdadi

Zijtveld

A relative and former colleague of the Algerian suspected of attacking a policeman outside the Notre Dame cathedral in Paris said Wednesday they struggled to believe he was a jihadist.

The attacker was shot and wounded by police on Tuesday after he lunged at an officer with a hammer in a square full of tourists in front of the landmark cathedral.

Documents found on the attacker identified him as Farid I, a 40-year-old Algerian student, and a source close to the investigation said police found a video in his flat in which he pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group.

Speaking to AFP in his North African homeland on Wednesday, the suspect’s nephew Sofiane I said it was hard to believe his relative had carried out the attack.

“At first we thought there must have been a mistake on the person’s identity. The man they’re talking about doesn’t correspond to the person we know,” he said on the phone from Bejaia, about 250 kms (150 miles) east of Algiers.

“Farid was a progressive. Nothing to do with any extremist movement. He just prayed like everyone else,” the lawyer and human rights activist said.

Farid was the youngest in a family of seven brothers and four sisters originally from Akbou, some 70 kms southwest of Bejaia, said Sofiane.

“His parents are in shock and can’t believe what’s happening — that their son is the person being talked about,” he said.

“Last year when he came on holiday, we discussed the situation in the Middle East. He said he didn’t believe in this group (IS) and even described (IS chief Abu Bakr) al-Baghdadi as an idiot,” he said. (AFP)