– Suspect shot in leg –
French police said they had foiled a terror strike in France by 34-year-old Reda Kriket – a man previously convicted in Belgium in a terror case alongside Paris attacks ringleader Abdelhamid Abaaoud – after arresting him and discovering explosives at his home.
Belgian police later arrested three people in connection with the new French conspiracy, prosecutors said.
In dramatic scenes, one of the suspects was shot in the leg at a tram stop in broad daylight in a huge operation by police in the Belgian capital’s Schaerbeek district, where police this week found a bomb factory linked to the Brussels attacks.
Deepening the links, Belgian prosecutors revealed that Brussels airport bomber Najim Laachraoui’s DNA was found on a suicide vest and a piece of cloth at the Bataclan concert hall where 90 people were killed during November’s Paris attacks, and on a bomb at the Stade de France stadium.
A huge manhunt is still under way for at least two suspects – one of the airport attackers whose bomb failed to go off and another man seen in the metro with the bomber there.
Investigators also say Khalid El Bakraoui rented an apartment in Brussels used by key Paris suspect Salah Abdeslam, who was taken into custody in the Belgian capital on March 18.
The nation’s federal prosecutor revealed Abdeslam “has invoked his right to silence” and has not spoken to investigators since a few brief interviews the day after his arrest.
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