The trial of the Paris attacks opens six years later

Six years later, the trial of Jihadist attacks of November 13, 2015 which left 130 dead starts Wednesday in Paris, with Salah Abdeslam, the sole survivor of the commando which carried out the attack, as the main accused.

From the Stade de France, north of Paris, to the terraces of the capital’s bars, via the Bataclan concert hall, the horror of bombs and gunshots erupted on this autumn night, which continues in the memory of the French.

The bloodiest attacks since World War II, which also left more than 350 injured, dealt another blow to the country months after the January attacks on satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo and a kosher food supermarket.

From September 8 and for nearly nine months, a special court will judge the Moroccan Franco Abdeslam and others 19 indicted for the November attacks, claimed by the jihadist group Islamic State (IS). Fourteen of the accused will be present.

“The trial promises to be full of emotion, but justice will have to take a step back if it does not want to lose sight of the principles on which our rule of law is based”, warned the lawyers of Abdeslam, Olivia Ronen and Martin Vettes .

For the victims, 300 of whom will testify in September and October, the trial represents an “important step” to move forward in their life, in the words of Arthur Dénouveaux, survivor of the Bataclan and president of the Life for Paris association.

Their testimonies will make “that humanity enters the test”, estimates Dénouveaux, for whom it is necessary to accept some “outbursts” of emotion.

Four years of research

Shortly after 9:00 p.m. on November 13, 2015, a suicide bomber detonated his explosives near the Stade de France, in the town of Saint-Denis, near Paris, where a friendly football match was taking place between France and Germany. . .

Then, in central Paris, two three-man commandos fired bullets at bar terraces and shot dead those attending a concert at the Bataclan, where the police launched an assault after midnight.

Two attackers fled. Five days later, Abdelhamid Abaaoud, head of operations for the attack, and his accomplice were killed during a police operation in a building in Saint-Denis, where they barricaded themselves.

While France mourned its dead, closed its borders and declared a state of emergency, justice opened an investigation in close collaboration with Belgian magistrates.

Four years of investigation have made it possible to reconstruct a large part of the logistics of the attacks and the route followed by the members of the command: along a migratory route from Syria to their rented hiding places in Belgium and near Paris.

Investigators have discovered a much larger jihadist cell also responsible for the attacks that killed 32 people on March 22, 2016 in the metro and at Brussels airport.

Avoid an “exceptional trial”

In the absence of the main person responsible for the attack, veteran jihadist Osama Atar, and other senior ISIS officials, all eyes will be on Salah Abdeslam and Mohamed Abrini, the “man with the hat” of the attacks from Brussels.

The court, which will not question them until 2022, will have to resolve the remaining unknowns, such as the exact role played by Abdeslam. The 31-year-old man remained silent during the investigation and the civil parties hope to face his silence again.

“We will ensure that this exceptional trial does not become an exceptional trial,” warned lawyers for the Moroccan franc. Twelve of the 20 defendants face life imprisonment.

This unprecedented procedure, which has nearly 1,800 civil parties formed, required two years of preparation and the construction of a special courtroom at the courthouse in Paris.

Holding a trial of this magnitude until its end, scheduled for May 25, 2022, represents a challenge for the judiciary, in the midst of a pandemic and with a high risk of terrorist threat.

More than a hundred witnesses were summoned to appear, including many French and Belgian investigators, as well as the French president at the time, François Hollande.

(with information from AFP)

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