Paris suspect Salah Abdeslam in Syria

The Wall Street Journal reported that a friend of Abdeslam, Ali Oulkadi, has been arrested and is facing trial for being one of the three people suspected in helping Abdeslam escape. “In the vehicle, Salah told him that his brother, Brahim, had killed people in Paris and had blown himself up”, Martins said. “For my client, a childhood mate, pal of the two brothers, it was a shock, He could not understand it and could not think clearly”.

In a separate report from International Business Times, Abdeslam was said to have contributed to the attack by buying the detonators used by the suicide bombers.

Abdeslam is known to have crossed into Belgium after the November 13 attacks and, along with Mohamed Abrini, seen with Abdeslam two days before the attacks, has been the subject of a massive worldwide manhunt.

The wanted poster for Salah Abdeslam, wanted in connection with the terror attacks in Paris.

It is unclear what role Abdeslam played in the attacks though it is thought that he drove the attackers to their destinations after investigators found his fingerprints in an abandoned vehicle.

The investigation was continuing as authorities in neighbouring Belgium charged a sixth suspect in relation to the atrocity a fortnight ago.

A source familiar with the investigation told CNN this month that Abdeslam’s “movements make no sense”, and his brother told Belgian state broadcaster RTBF that he believes Abdeslam decided at the last minute not to go through with an attack.

Giving background to his client’s case, the lawyer said that around noon on Saturday 14 November Oulkadi got a call from an unnamed friend who asked him to pick him up in the Laeken area in the north-west of Brussels to take him to nearby Schaerbeek.

“It is possible that somebody else may have jettisoned it”, Cruikshank said, “an attacker that we don’t know much about at this point”.

The Belgian prosecutor’s office hasn’t identified the three others held.

Federal prosecutors said on Friday that they had charged a man detained in Brussels with terrorist murders and participation in the activities of a terrorist group.