Geneva police hunt suspects as part of Paris attacks probe

Police in Geneva were "actively searching" for suspects in connection with an investigation into the Paris attacks last month, Swiss security officials said Thursday.

Geneva's security department said that city authorities received word on Wednesday that Swiss federal authorities had flagged “suspicious individuals who could be in Geneva or the Geneva region.”

A security guard at the United Nations in Geneva told Reuters that Swiss authorities were searching for four people believed to be in the city — which is close to the French border — or nearby. Another guard said the U.N. compound was on maximum alert. 

“In the framework of investigations carried out following the Paris attacks, at the international and national level, Geneva police and their partners are actively looking for people whose description has been provided by the Swiss Confederation,” the Geneva department of security said in a statement.

It was not immediately clear from the Geneva statement, however, whether the suspects were directly linked to the Paris attacks.  

Police were more broadly increasing security measures, and were working with international and national authorities to locate the suspects, the statement said. It didn't specify how many people were being sought or provide their identities.

U.N. security guards in Geneva, the European headquarters of the world body, were stationed with MP5 sub-machine guns at entry points for cars, a highly unusual measure at the sprawling complex.

“It is maximum alert,” a second U.N. guard told Reuters. Swiss and French officials say they have been working closely together since the Paris attacks. 

The Nov. 13 attacks on Paris, claimed by the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), left 130 people dead and hundreds of others wounded. Salah Abdeslam, a fugitive suspected in the deadly attacks in Paris, is still at large. Several arrests were made in Belgium following the attacks.

Wire services