Women in terror cell were ‘guided’ by ISIS, says Paris prosecutor

PARIS — A “terrorist cell” made up mainly of radicalised young Frenchwomen has been dismantled by security forces, the Paris prosecutor said on Friday (Sept 9), after a car filled with gas canisters was found this week in the heart of Paris.

The prosecutor, Francois Molins, whose office handles domestic terrorism investigations, said the women had been “guided remotely” from Syria by the Islamic State group, and they had links to assailants in previous terrorist attacks in France.

One of the women had even been engaged to be married to two assailants, the killer of two police officers in June and the killer of a priest in July, he said.

Mr Molins said the use of a terrorist cell made up almost entirely of young women represented a chilling turn in the Islamic State’s tactics.

“If at first it appeared that women were confined to family and domestic chores by the Daesh terrorist organisation, it must be noted that this view is now completely outdated,” Mr Molins, using an Arabic acronym for the Islamic State, said at a news conference on Friday in Paris.

Though the car with the gas canisters had not been rigged to explode, Mr Molins said, there were signs that it was meant to catch fire. Police found a blanket with traces of fuel and a cigarette butt in the car, a Peugeot 607 sedan, he said.

“This commando’s goal was clearly to carry out an attack,” Mr Molins said, adding that French intelligence had gathered information pointing to an imminent attack Thursday.

Seven people were in custody Friday in connection with the case; five of them were women, including three who were arrested Thursday in Boussy-Saint-Antoine, a small town about 20 miles southeast of Paris. Mr Molins described the women as “totally receptive” to Islamic State propaganda, and he suggested that they may have met one another online.

He identified one of the women as Ines M., the 19-year-old daughter of the owner of the Peugeot, which was found near Notre Dame Cathedral. Mr Molins said that when she was arrested, Ines M. had the keys to the car in her bag, as well as a written pledge of allegiance to the Islamic State and its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

In the pledge, Ines M wrote that she was “answering the call of al-Adnani,” referring to Abu Muhammad al-Adnani, a senior Islamic State figure who had called on Muslims in the West to carry out attacks. Al-Adnani was reported killed in Syria last month.

Mr Molins said the Peugeot contained fingerprints and DNA linked to Ornella G, 29, who was arrested with her boyfriend earlier in the week. Another couple arrested earlier in the week have been released, Agence France-Presse reported.

A figure who appears to be central to the case, Sarah H, 23, was arrested in Boussy-Saint-Antoine with Ines M and a third woman, Amel S, 39, a resident of the town.

Mr Molins said that Sarah H was known by intelligence services to be “particularly linked to the jihadi movement”. He said she had formerly been “betrothed” to Larossi Abballa, the killer of the two police officers in Magnanville in June, and Adel Kermiche, one of the men who killed a priest in Normandy in July.

Mt Molins did not specify how long Sarah H. had been linked to either man, and did not say whether she had even met them in person. Each was shot dead by police during the attacks.

Mr Molins did say that Sarah H. had been about to enter into a religious marriage with a third man, Mohamed Lamine Aberouz, 22. Aberouz’s brother was close to Abballa and was detained after the killings in Magnanville.

Mr Molins said police found the three women using mobile phone records and other data. When an unmarked police car arrived Thursday at the apartment building where Amel S lived, he said, officers saw Sarah H, Ines M and Amel S coming out. He added that Sarah H. was fully veiled but that Ines M wore a baseball cap.

By his account, Sarah H, after pausing in the parking lot, ran toward the police car and lunged through the open window with an 8-inch kitchen knife, wounding one officer in the shoulder. As the three women tried to flee, Ines M also lunged at an officer with a knife, he said, and the officer shot her in the leg.

After the three were arrested, a search of Amel S’s apartment found seven empty glass bottles with what appeared to be “homemade paper fuses”, the prosecutor said. Amel S’s 15-year-old daughter, whom he said was “likely to be involved in the terrorist project”, was arrested Friday morning, north of Paris.

President Francois Hollande praised the work of the French intelligence and security forces Friday but warned that there were sure to be other groups still plotting attacks.

Before the discovery of the Peugeot early Sunday, Mr Molins was expressing concerns about the growing number of women involved in terrorism. He noted in an interview with Le Monde last week that authorities had lodged preliminary terrorism-related charges against 59 women in France, and that the hundreds of Frenchwomen who have gone to Syria may return one day with plans to conduct terrorism.

“These past months, we have seen an acceleration in the number of cases involving young, minor girls, with profiles that are very worrisome, and personalities that are very harsh,” Mr Molins said. “Sometimes they are behind terrorist plots that, on an intellectual level, are starting to be very developed.” THE NEW YORK TIMES