Now the 26-year-old Boumeddiene is the subject of a massive hunt after Coulibalysaid to be linked to two brothers accused in Wednesday’s massacre at the offices of a Parisian satirical magazine Charlie Hebdoallegedly killed hostages at a Paris kosher supermarket Friday before police fatally shot him.
Police earlier named Boumeddiene and Coulibaly as suspects in Thursday’s slaying of a female police officer in the southern Paris suburb of Montrouge.
With Coulibaly dead, and Charlie Hebdo suspects Cherif and Said Kouachi killed Friday at a separate standoff north of Paris, Boumeddiene is the last prime, publicly identified suspect that police are seeking in connection with France’s recent wave of terror attacks.
Whether Boumeddiene was even in France during this week’s attacks is unclear. Boumeddiene is thought to left for Turkey “to reach Syria” at the around January 1 or 2, according to a French source close to the nation’s security services. If this is true, Boumeddiene was not in France at the time of the attacks.
Earlier, French police union spokesman Pascal Disant said Boumeddiene may have left Friday’s market siege and eluded capture as hostages were freed. So far, no witness has publicly said she was there.
But Disant said that the Kouachi brothers and Coulibaly were part of the same jihadist groups, and Paris prosecutor Francois Molins indicated Boumedienne and Cherif Kouachi’s wife also were well-connected, saying they exchanged 500 phone calls in 2014.
–
Some police were injured in the operation at the grocery, and at least 10 hostages escaped, according to Disant.
The hostages being held at the market near Porte de Vincennes are alive, and “the terrorist is dead,” tweeted Gerard Araud, the French ambassador to the United States.
During the police operation, officers shouted “get down!” and “we’ve got him,” video from CNN affiliate BFMTV shows.
President François Hollande praised police but noted continuing dangers for the country, without specifying those perils.
“France is not done with threats that are targeting (the country),” Hollande said in a televised address to the nation.
