French security services have foiled at least five planned terrorist attacks since Islamic extremists killed 17 people in Paris, including journalists at the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo, according to the prime minister, Manuel Valls.
“The threat has never been so serious, we have never had to face this kind of terrorism in all our history,” Valls said on Thursday.
His warning came as French police searched for accomplices of an Algerian-born student suspected of planning an “imminent” terrorist attack in Paris.
The 24-year-old man was still under armed guard in hospital on Thursday. He was discovered bleeding heavily on a street in a south-east Paris on Sunday morning having apparently shot himself in the leg.
François Molins, the Paris prosecutor, said the man was believed to have been planning to attack two churches in the city suburbs.
He said material found at the suspect’s home suggested he was in contact with someone “believed to be in Syria” and with whom he had exchanged messages “on how to commit an attack”. Molins added: “This person had explicitly asked him to target a church,.”
An arsenal of weapons and documents “in Arabic mentioning al-Qaida and Islamic State” were discovered during a search of the flat and suspect’s car, which was parked near to where he was found, the prosecutor told journalists.
The number of weapons suggest he was not operating alone, said Molins. The investigation was looking at “who had financed the weapons seized and where they came from”.
Police said a Kalashnikov assault rifle and three spare bullet cartridges, a police-issue Sig Sauer pistol – reported stolen by an officer – were found in the suspect’s car along with a Sphinx 9mm revolver and a bulletproof vest. At his studio flat at the university nearby in the 13th arrondissement, a further three Kalashnikovs and several bulletproof vests were discovered.
Investigators say the first ballistic, DNA and phone tracing records link the suspect to the death of a 32-year-old woman, Aurélie Châtelain, who was found dead in the passenger seat of her car with three bullets in the head on Sunday morning. Molins said the man had no previous criminal record, but was known to the security services because of his stated wish to join jihadists in Syria.
Police have searched the homes of family members and arrested a 25-year-old woman.
Molins said the man ranted several times to the police before refusing to speak. Investigators have been given permission to hold him for a further six days, a special measure used in cases in which there is a risk of “imminent terrorist action”.
Valls said 1,573 French nationals or people resident in France were “listed as being implicated in terrorist networks”. Of these 442 are believed to be in Syria where 97 have died.
“The call centre allowing citizens to raise the alarm in cases of radicalisation has already had more than 2,600 calls of which 630 have been judged very serious and investigated by the special services,” he said, adding that since 2012 “the threat has not stopped increasing”.
