One of the main suspects in the Paris and Brussels terrorist attacks will be sent to France to face charges, a court has decided, although he may stand trial in Belgium first.
Mohamed Abrini, a 31-year old Belgian-Moroccan dual citizen, became known as the “man in the hat” after he was captured on CCTV walking alongside two suicide attackers, shortly before they detonated bombs at Brussels airport in March in coordinated strikes that killed 35 people.
Abrini was already one of Europe’s most wanted people, having been identified as one of two suspects seen travelling by car to Paris, two days before attacks on the French capital that killed 130 people.
On Thursday, the pre-trial chamber of the Brussels tribunal decided that a French request for Abrini’s transfer under the European arrest warrant was enforceable, prosecutors announced. But Abrini may stand trial in Belgium first, delaying his transfer to France. “Belgium will keep hold of Mr Abrini until his trial,” criminal lawyer Yannick de Vlaemynck told RTL TV. “After the trial or his sentence in Belgium, he could eventually be transferred to France.”
A spokesman for Belgium’s federal prosecutor told local media that Abrini’s transfer would not happen immediately.
Abrini was arrested in April and confessed he had been at Brussels airport on the morning of the attacks, according to Belgian prosecutors. A second Belgian man, Mohamed Bakkali, 29, who is suspected of being one of the planners behind the Paris attacks, will also be extradited to France.
Bakkali has been in prison since last November. In March, footage of a senior Belgian nuclear official coming and going from his home was discovered, raising fears of an attack on the country’s nuclear sites.
Belgium’s federal prosecutor announced that six people, including Abrini, are to be detained for a further month in connection with the Brussels attacks. A further four people are being held for another month in relation to the Paris mass shootings.
One of the men is being held over attacks in both capitals: he is believed to be Osama Krayem, a Swedish national who was near the scene of the Brussels metro attack. Krayem is believed to have bought the suitcases used in the Brussels bombings. His DNA was found in a number of safe houses where the Paris mass murders were planned.
