International
Francois Mori / AP
France made an unprecedented demand on Tuesday for its European Union allies to support its military action against the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) as it launched new airstrikes on the group's Syrian stronghold, days after attacks in Paris linked to the group killed at least 129 people.
France invoked a never-before-used article of the EU's Lisbon Treaty obliging members of the 28-nation bloc to give “aid and assistance by all the means in their power“ to a member country that is “the victim of armed aggression on its territory.”
French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said EU partners could help “either by taking part in France's operations in Syria or Iraq, or by easing the load or providing support for France in other operations.”
Arriving for talks in Brussels on Tuesday with his EU counterparts, Greek Defense Minister Panagiotis Kammenos told reporters that “we're in a new situation in Europe. This is Sept. 11 for Europe.”
French military spokesman Col. Gilles Jaron said the latest airstrikes in ISIL's de-facto capital of Raqqa destroyed a command post and training camp.
A media activist in Raqqa, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Al Jazeera on Tuesday that French airstrikes had targeted abandoned ISIL bases in the suburbs of the city, where there are no civilians or ISIL fighters.
“It has been two insane nights. Abandoned ISIL posts were targeted at the entrance of the city, along with ISIL checkpoints and several other points. Electricity and water have been cut off as supply lines were hit too,” the activist said. “We can confirm that there were no civilians killed or injured in the latest French airstrikes.”
On Monday, President Francois Hollande vowed to forge a united coalition capable of defeating the armed group at home and abroad. The Paris attacks on Friday, claimed by ISIL, have galvanized international determination to confront the group.
Hollande has said the victims came from at least 19 nations, and the international community, led by the U.S. and Russia, must overcome their deep-seated divisions over Syria to destroy ISIL on its home turf.
Authorities have yet to announce the capture of anyone suspected of direct involvement in the slaughter, though police have used emergency powers to conduct almost 300 searches since Sunday night that netted 127 arrests and 31 weapons.
A car with Belgian license plates and a shattered front passenger window found Tuesday in northern Paris could be linked to the attacks, officials said. It was the third vehicle identified as having possible links to the investigation.
Seven attackers died — six after detonating suicide belts and a seventh from police gunfire — but Iraqi intelligence officials told The Associated Press that its sources indicated 19 participated in the attack and five others provided hands-on logistical support.
In Belgium, a lawyer for one of the two people arrested there said his client admits going to France, but only to pick up a friend. Defense lawyer Xavier Carrette told the AP that his client, 27-year-old Mohammed Amri, was arrested over the weekend and is being held on charges of terrorist acts and being part of a terrorist conspiracy.
A cease-fire between Syria's government and opposition — which would allow nations supporting Syria's various factions to focus more on ISIL — could be just weeks away, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said. He described it as potentially a “gigantic step,” opening the way for deeper international cooperation.
Kerry flew to France as a gesture of solidarity and met Hollande and Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius on Tuesday.
Standing with Hollande at the Elysee Palace, Kerry said the carnage in the French capital on Friday, along with recent attacks in Egypt, Lebanon and Turkey, made it clear that more pressure must be brought to bear on ISIL.
Kerry said, “We have to step up our efforts to hit them at the core where they're planning these things and also obviously to do more on borders in terms the movement of people.”
Hollande said the “acts of war” were decided and planned in Syria, which he said was “the biggest factory of terrorism the world has ever known and the international community is still too divided and too incoherent.”
The attacks “were organized in Belgium and perpetrated on our soil with French complicity with one specific goal: to sow fear and to divide us,” Hollande told parliament in a rare joint session convened at the Palace of Versailles.
French and other Western intelligence agencies face an urgent challenge to track down the surviving members of the three ISIL units who inflicted the unprecedented bloodshed in France and, perhaps more importantly, to target their distant commanders in ISIL-controlled parts of Syria.
A French security official said intelligence officials had identified Abdelhamid Abaaoud, a Belgian of Moroccan descent, as chief architect of the attacks on a rock concert, a soccer game and popular nightspots in one of Paris' trendiest districts.
The official cited chatter from ISIL figures that Abaaoud had recommended a concert as an ideal target for inflicting maximum casualties, as well as electronic communications between Abaaoud and one of the Paris attackers who blew himself up.
The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive investigation.
Abaaoud came to public attention last year after boasting in an ISIL propaganda video about his pride in piling the dead bodies of “infidel” enemies into a trailer. Security agencies previously linked him to a series of abortive shooting plots this year in Belgium and France, including a planned attack on a passenger train that was thwarted by American passengers who overpowered a lone gunman.
Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said Tuesday that police carried out 128 police raids overnight, as he conceded that “the majority of those who were involved in this attack were unknown to our services.”
In the United States, Republican Rep. Mac Thornberry, who is chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said he understands that some of the terrorists who conducted the attacks were known to U.S. officials.
Meanwhile, German police said they would release seven people detained earlier on Tuesday over suspicions of being linked to the Paris attacks. A soccer match between Germany and the Netherlands that was to be played in Hannover was also canceled Tuesday after a what German media said was a bomb threat.
Al Jazeera and The Associated Press. Diana Al Rifai contributed to this report.
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