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DImmersed in the historic courthouse of Paris, on the banks of the Seine, the builders were putting the finishing touches to an extraordinary architectural structure described as a cross between a high-security bunker and a modern church.
Its clean light wood and white lighting were chosen by the French Justice Ministry to create “a sense of calm” in contrast to the gruesome events that will soon be examined there. This provisional structure will host from next week the largest criminal trial ever held in France, when 20 men are accused of having planned, aided and perpetrated the terrorist attacks in Paris in November 2015 against a stadium, bars and restaurants and the Bataclan concert hall.
The trial, which will last nine months and will bring together witnesses including former President Francois Hollande, is seen as a crucial step in addressing the personal and national trauma of the coordinated attacks that killed 130 people and injured more than 490 people. It is not clear whether the main defendants will break their silence on the massacre that Hollande calls “an act of war”.
The attacks, claimed by the Islamic State, began around 9 p.m. on a Friday evening, November 13, 2015, when a suicide bomber blew himself up after failing to enter the Stade de France. Hollande was one of 80,000 people in the stadium to watch a France-Germany football match. This attack was followed by car shootings and suicide bombings in cafes and restaurants in Paris, and a Bataclan attack during an Eagles of Death Metal rock concert where 90 people were killed.
The key figure in the trial is Salah Abdeslam, believed to be the last survivor of the 10-man cell that struck the town, most of whom committed suicide or were killed by police.
Abdeslam, 31, a French citizen born in Brussels, was said to have been at the center of the vast logistical operation that saw the jihadists return to Europe from Syria, via the migrant route. He allegedly escorted the three suicide bombers who blew themselves up at the Stade de France. He is suspected of having possibly planned to commit his own suicide bombing in the 18th arrondissement of Paris, and to back down. His brother blew himself up and died in a Parisian bar during the attacks. Abdeslam went into hiding south of Paris after the attacks and called contacts in Brussels to pick him up by car at 5.30am. After a manhunt, he was arrested four months later in a Brussels apartment. A few days after his arrest, suicide bombers believed to be part of the same cell struck at Brussels airport and in the metro, killing 32 and injuring 270.
Mohamed Abrini, 36, Abdeslam’s childhood friend, who allegedly traveled to the Paris region with the attackers, will also be tried in Paris, which was then captured by CCTV with the two bombers from Brussels airport.
A total of 20 suspects are accused of providing various planning and logistical support. Six will be tried in absentia: five are presumed dead in Iraq or Syria and one is in prison in Turkey.
Arthur Dénouveaux, the president of the survivor group Life for Paris, was a rock fan watching the Bataclan concert when assailants broke out opening fire. He managed to escape and led the group members to run through the streets of Paris, handing them € 50 and putting them in a taxi. “I was completely beside myself that night,” he said.
Dénouveaux will speak in court, within the close-knit community of Bataclan survivors. “The first layer of what we have to say is about the horror of terrorism, the trauma, how it destroys a life and the lives of the people around you. Second, the fact that we can talk shows that terrorism is a dead end. It does not work. It ruins lives and does not help any real political project. It’s just absolute nihilism, however you disguise it. Finally, if we are able to carry all these messages, this in itself proves that resilience exists.
He said the survivors wanted to put an end to the myths that had developed around the attack, establish the facts and not see the events co-opted for politics or prejudice. “For me, the facts are: I was at Bataclan and I was shot. But in France, it has also become a problem with migrants and the fact that terrorists can enter the country with migrants. It became a subject of foreign policy when Donald Trump mentioned the Bataclan during one of his events, it became an issue on Islam in France. It got too big for the facts… everything is exaggerated around November 13th because it is such an extreme event.
Michael O’Connor, a British leader, is among many foreign survivors who return to Paris to speak in court. He said: “This presents our best opportunity to possibly get closure.” There were questions on a “global scale of why and how it happened” that he would like to understand better, but also more personal questions about the events themselves. “When I got out of the Bataclan I was very confused, even for how long I stayed inside,” he said.
Thomas Ricard, lawyer for 21 Bataclan survivors from the UK and Ireland, said foreign survivors faced specific challenges. “Some left Paris the next morning. If at 6 a.m. you are on a plane or a train to return to a foreign city, there is a distance with the process of collective mourning in Paris. For those who lived far away, there was a feeling of: was it real? Did it happen? This disconnection can have an impact on the acceptance of attacks. Some people may not have had tangible physical injuries, but they saw scenes of monstrous warfare. The process of trauma and grief is very real.
Matthieu Chirez, who will represent the British and Irish survivors in court, said: “Among the survivors there is a search for the truth. There is the collective, long-term work of recovery from suffering and grief. But there is also a real lucidity that we might not get all the answers in this trial. “
The trial, after a five-year investigation, is not mandated to determine whether or not there were breaches of French state security or intelligence.
Patricia Correia, whose daughter Précilia and her companion were killed in Bataclan, is one of the co-founders of the 13onze15 group for families and survivors. She said: “This trial is necessary not only for justice, but also to preserve the memory of what happened. It needs to be written – almost set in stone – and passed on to future generations. “
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