Unclear if suspect arrested in Belgium is "man in the hat"
BRUSSELS-- A fugitive suspect in theParis attacks in November was arrested in Belgium on Friday, officials said, after a raid Belgian authorities said was linked to the deadly March 22 Brussels bombings.
Belgian officials said it's unclear if the suspect, Mohamed Abrini, is also the mysterious "man in the hat" who escaped the double bombing at the Zaventem airport. However, if true, that would mean Abrini had a key role in both attacks carried out by the ISIS cell that left a total of 162 people dead - 130 in Paris and 32 in Brussels.
"We are investigating if Abrini can be identified as the third person at the Brussels national airport, the so- called man with the hat," said Belgian prosecutor Eric Van der Sypt.
Friday's arrest of five people came a day after Belgian authorities released photos and video of the airport suspect.
Abrini was the last identified suspect still at large from the Nov. 13 attacks in Paris which killed 130 people, although his precise role has never been clear. He is a 31-year-old Belgian-Moroccan petty criminal believed to have traveled early last summer to Syria where his younger brother died in 2014 in the Islamic State group's notorious francophone brigade.
Abrini lived in the Brussels neighborhood of Molenbeek, a predominately Muslim community that has, in recent months, become the ground zero of terror in Europe.
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Another man arrested on Friday, Osama K., alias Naim al Ahmed, was seen with Brussels subway bomber Khalid El Bakraoui just before the March 22 attacks, the prosecutor said.
Osama K. was also filmed by security cameras in the City 2 shopping mall when the bags were bought that were used by the suicide bombers who attacked Brussels Airport the same morning.
Belgian prosecutors said fingerprints and DNA from Abrini had been found in a Renault Clio used in the Paris attacks, and in an apartment in the Forest area of the Belgian capital that was used by Salah Abdeslam, another Paris suspect, as a hideout until police stumbled upon it.
Abrini has not resurfaced since the emergence of surveillance video placing him in the convoy with the attackers headed to Paris. He had ties to Abdelhamid Abbaoud, the ringleader of the Paris attacks who died in a police standoff on Nov. 18, and is a childhood friend of brothers Salah and Brahim Abdeslam.
He went multiple times to Birmingham, England, last year, meeting with several men suspected of terrorist activity, a European security official has told The Associated Press. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to provide details on the investigation. He said the meetings, including one later last summer, took place in several locations, including cafes and apartments.
He was traveling with Salah Abdeslam, who is in jail in Belgium for involvement in the Paris attacks, in the convoy headed to Paris in the 36 hours leading up to the attacks. On Thursday, Abdeslam's lawyer said it will take some weeks before his client can be extradited from Belgium to France.
The man in the hat was with the two suicide bombers who killed 16 people at Brussels airport on March 22. A second arrest could also be linked to the Maelbeek subway bombing that killed another 16 people during rush hour that morning.
On Thursday, authorities released photos and video of a man wearing a dark hat, leaving the airport on foot, walking to the nearby town of Zaventem and then into Brussels, where all traces of him were reportedly lost.
The appeal for public assistance more than two weeks after the suicide bombings indicates that investigators were at a standstill.
The arrest of Abrini was first reported by Belgian broadcaster VRT.