10,000 troops to be deployed across France

following Paris attacks

President Hollande aims to impose state of emergency for three months after amending 1955 law

Mounted police officers patrol in front of the Eiffel Tower in Paris following the attacks (AFP)

Sunday 15 November 2015

French Prime Minister Manuel Valls on Sunday afternoon pledged to deploy
10,000 soldiers throughout France, with between 4,000 and 5,000 to be put on the
streets of Paris alone.
This number will supplement the 7,000 troops which have already been deployed
since the January Charlie Hebdo attacks in which gunmen killed 17 people, Valls
office said in a statement.
The announcement follows on from the worst attack to hit France since the
Second World War with seven attackers on Friday killing 129 people across the
French capital.
Security operations are now continuing throughout France as well as in Belgium,
Greece and Germany as European authorities try to hunt down those responsible
for the bloody attack, which has since been claimed by the Islamic State.
Three brothers are now known to have been involved, sources close to the
investigation said on Sunday. One brother died in the attacks late Friday, the
sources said. One is in custody in Belgium although it is unclear whether he took

part in the rampage, while the third either took part and died during the attacks or
is at large, they added.
At least seven people have been arrested in Belgium in connection with the attack,
with early indications suggesting that at least part of it was organised in
Brussels. According to Belgian prosecutors two of the attackers were Frenchmen
who had been living in Belgium.
The first round of arrests that took place on Saturday focused on the suburb of
Molenbeek, which has had previous links to terrorism.
Belgian Interior Minister Jan Jambon has vowed to clean up Molenbeek, with
Belgium police launching an official terrorism investigation.
The links to Belgium were unearthed when one of the cars believed to have been
used by an attacker was found to have a Belgian parking ticket inside. Two other
cars that were used by attackers were also rented in Belgium.

This picture shows a general view of the vicinity of a police intervention to arrest people in connection with the deadly attacks in
Paris (AFP)

Another vehicle believed to have been used by one of the gunmen who fired at
people in restaurants on Friday was found in the north-western Paris suburb of
Montreuil on Sunday. Several AK47 rifles of the sort used during the attacks
in Paris were found in the car, a judicial source told AFP.

So far, only one of the attackers has been identified. Paris-born, 29-year-old Omar
Ismail Mostefai blew himself up at the Bataclan concert hall, scene of one of the
attacks. It is not yet known if he is part of the network of brothers linked to the
incident but seven people close to him, including his father and 34-year-old
brother, have been taken into custody by police for questioning. A source close to
the probe said investigators were searching the homes of Mostefais friends and
relatives.
Investigators said Mostefai, whose identity was confirmed using a severed
fingertip, was known to have links to radical Islam but had never previously been
linked to terrorism.
An arrest has also taken place in Germany, with police quizzing a man who was
taken into custody last week for having explosives and Kalashnikovs in his car. The
51-year-old man from Montenegro told police he was going to Paris "to see the
Eiffel Tower" but he has refused to discuss attacks, police said on Sunday.
"We want to talk [about the Paris attacks] with him but he doesn't want to talk.
Not about this subject in any case," a spokesman for police in southern Bavaria
said.
The British government meanwhile has deployed special forces to back British
police on the streets and has also strengthened security at ports and airports.
"There are tried and tested arrangements in place to give military support," Home
Secretary Theresa May told the BBC.
European Union interior ministers are now set to hold crisis talks in Brussels on
Friday to tackle security issues.
"Confronted with barbarism and terrorism, Europe stands united with France,"
said Etienne Schneider, Luxembourg's internal security minister.
The French government, which is a key part of the US-led anti-Islamic State
coalition carrying out air strikes in Iraq and Syria, has vowed to continue the
bombing, with Valls on Saturday saying that France would annihilate IS.
The United States has said that it plans to intensify coordination with France on a
military response in Syria following the attack, a top White House adviser said on
Sunday.
"First of all, we're clearly going to work very closely with the French in terms of
intelligence sharing, also in terms of their military response inside of Syria,"
deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes said.

"The French have been with us in Iraq and Syria and conducting air strikes. I think
we want to continue to intensify that coordination."
However, the right-wing opposition leader and former French president Nicholas
Sarkozy has lashed out at the present Socialist administration.
His successor, President Francois Hollande, has advanced a new political strategy
for immigration and and dramatically modified our security strategy, Sarkozy
said in a statement issued after meeting Hollande.
The far-right National Front leader Marie Le Pen has so far stayed relatively quiet
on the matter, but could well gain political points by once again attacking
government policy and advancing a tougher stance on immigration and security.
The difference between this and Charlie Hebdo is that then it was journalists and
police, symbols and institutions of the republic. These latest attacks were against
ordinary people, all and everyone, men, women, children, Madani Cheurfa, an
analyst with Science Pos research thinktank Cevipov, told The Observer.
And they allow the FN and Marine Le Pen to say, I told you so, weve been talking
about this threat for years but nobody listened, so give us your vote.
Other commentators have also suggested that the attacks will force Hollande, a
fierce critic of Syria's President Bashar al-Assad, to shift gears.
"The Paris attack could have the effect of forcing Hollande to decide who [Assad or
IS] is public enemy number one, leaving number two to one side for the moment,"
French journalist Pierre Haski wrote in a column for The Guardian.
"If he makes the subtle shift that many recommend, including military chiefs who
feel the French army is overstretched, it will not reduce Frances involvement in
the Middle East crisis, but it will reduce its autonomy. Hollandes singular path
may have been derailed by the Paris killers."
New tactics
Police said they were investigating whether the attackers, who appeared to be
"seasoned, at first sight, and well trained", had ever fought in Syria, where IS has
proclaimed a caliphate along with territory in neighbouring Iraq.
The at least seven attackers - six of whom blew themselves up and one who was
shot by police - are the first ever to carry out suicide bombings on French soil.
Unlike those who killed 17 people in Paris in January, they were unknown to
security services. They also used the sort of suicide vests normally associated with

bombings in the Middle East.

"Suicide vests require a munitions specialist. To make a reliable and effective
explosive is not something anyone can do," a former French intelligence chief told
AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.
"A munitions specialist is someone who is used to handling explosives, who knows
how to make them, to arrange them in a way that the belt or vest is not so
unwieldy that the person can't move. And it must also not blow up by accident."
Two Syrian passports were found at the scene, leading to speculation that the
attackers arrived in Europe as refugees, although the documents have now been
ruled as fake with speculation rife about why the attackers took the documents
with them.
France has declared three days of national mourning for the dead.
Posted by Thavam