U.S. Says Airstrikes Killed Militants Tied to Paris Attacks
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Version 0 of 1. LONDON — Airstrikes by the American-led coalition assisting Iraq’s armed forces have killed 10 Islamic State commanders in Iraq and Syria over the past month, including some linked to the Paris attacks, a United States military spokesman said on Tuesday. The spokesman, Col. Steven H. Warren, also said some of the commanders killed in the airstrikes had been plotting further assaults on Western targets. Colonel Warren, who spoke in Baghdad, did not explain precisely how American officials knew the identities of those killed. But he identified one as Charaffe al-Mouadan, who he said had died in an airstrike in Syria on Dec. 24. Mr. Mouadan was an associate of several participants in the Paris attacks on Nov. 13, and had been wanted by the French authorities for questioning. Colonel Warren said Mr. Mouadan “had a direct link” with Abdelhamid Abaaoud, believed to have been the chief organizer of the Paris attacks, and had been “actively planning attacks against the West.” Mr. Mouadan, the child of Moroccan immigrant parents, was a childhood friend of Samy Amimour, 28, one of the three gunmen who attacked a packed Paris concert hall, the Bataclan, killing 90 people. They grew up in Drancy, a working-class suburb northeast of Paris. The French authorities opened an investigation into the two men, along with a third friend, Samir Bouabout, in October 2012, the French newspaper Le Parisien reported last week. Mr. Bouabout had raised suspicions after taking classes at a shooting range in March 2012, the newspaper reported. Officials from the French domestic intelligence agency, the General Directorate for Internal Security, feared that the three men were planning to travel to Yemen or Afghanistan to wage jihad, but the men insisted that they were only planning to travel to Tunisia, the newspaper reported. At the time Mr. Mouadan was thought to be the leader of the small group, according to the newspaper. Mr. Mouadan left France for Syria in August 2013, Le Parisien reported. All three of the Bataclan attackers — Mr. Mouadan’s childhood friend, Mr. Amimour, and two other Frenchmen, Foued Mohamed-Aggad and Ismaël Omar Mostefaï — had fought for the Islamic State in Syria, according to the French government. Mr. Mouadan returned to the attention of the authorities after a survivor of the attack on the Bataclan recalled hearing the three gunmen — who ultimately died when the police stormed the concert hall — talking about consulting an accomplice, “Souleymane.” Souleymane was a nickname used by Mr. Mouadan, and the authorities suspected that he may have been involved in the logistics of the attack. |