Paris attacks: ‘mastermind’ terror cell cornered in Saint-Denis

Two people were killed, five police hurt and a bloodstained gunman was one of seven arrested in a French police raid.

Two people have been killed, five police hurt and a bloodstained semi-naked gunman was one of seven arrested in a drawn-out French police raid targeting the mastermind and other members of the terrorist cell involved in the devastating Paris attacks.

After a sustained shootout targeting a third-floor apartment in Saint-Denis, in the city’s northern suburbs, a female suicide bomber fired a Kalashnikov at police and then exploded her vest. Another occupant was killed by shrapnel when a grenade ­exploded.

Police then moved in to arrest three others in the flat, all believed to be part of the terrorist network that orchestrated and carried out the Paris attacks on Friday night.

However, this assault by the anti-­terrorism unit of the French police encountered far more resistance than expected. Hours later, one of those arrested was escorted to a police van semi-naked and handcuffed and surrounded by scores of police, having been stripped by officers checking for weapons.

Late yesterday Turkish police detained eight suspected Islamic State members who they say were planning to sneak into Europe posing as refugees. Counter-terror police detained the suspects in Istanbul airport after they flew in from the Moroccan city of Casablanca. The police found a hand-written note on one of the suspects ­detailing a migration route from Istanbul to Germany via Greece, Serbia and Hungary, including smuggler boats across the Mediterranean Sea, as well as several train and bus journeys.

HOW YESTERDAY UNFOLDED: Two dead as Paris raids end

The French authorities said the discovery of a mobile phone at one of the crime scenes after the Paris attacks had led police to the Saint-Denis apartment. The last message on the phone, found near the Bataclan concert hall, said “Ok, we’re ready’’ and contained a ­detailed plan of the inside of the venue.

It also contained information that suggested suspected Paris mastermind Abdelhamid Abaaoud might be in the apartment in Saint-Denis, a French prosecutor said.

Throughout yesterday morning there had been a long standoff as the ­entire suburb of Saint-Denis was shut down. Police were cautious about the flat being booby-trapped and the possibility that further gunmen were on the run. Police confirmed five police were injured in the raid and a police dog, Diesel, was killed.

The police prosecutor said the identities of those arrested were still being determined. Police also ­detained two people at a nearby property, including one man who claimed to have rented the flat to “two Belgians”. Two others from a separate property were also ­arrested.

Police said they had been targeting Abaaoud, the 28-year-old Belgian blamed for a series of ­attacks, including a failed attack on an Amsterdam-to-Paris train.

Another suspect in the building was believed to be Europe’s most wanted man, Salah Abdeslam, who was nicknamed the missing eighth terrorist. The suicide bomber may have been the female ­terrorist described by witnesses of the Bataclan theatre atrocity.

The raid came as France and Russia intensified airstrikes on ­Islamic State in Syria in retaliation for the Paris assault and the suspected bombing of a Russian passenger jet over Sinai.

The strikes raised hopes that French President Francois Hollande’s ambition for an inter­national “grand coalition” to crush Islamic State could become a ­reality this month.

Barack Obama said yesterday he had told Russian President Vladimir Putin the two countries could co-operate on Syria if Moscow pledged to focus on Islamic State, not other rebel groups fighting to oust the Assad regime.

“That is something that we very much want to see,” Mr Obama said in The Philippines.

Mr Hollande will visit Washington and Moscow next week to build the alliance. The main ­obstacle to the major powers working together is Russia’s insistence on keeping Syrian president Bashar al-Assad in power.

Questions have been raised as to how Abaaoud, who was such a feared terrorist and ­active recruiter for Islamic State, had been able to return to France from Syria undetected. Abaaoud had been the target of coalition force attacks in Syria just over a month ago.

One route may have been through the porous European borders used by migrants through the Balkans, with only cursory checks because of the sheer numbers of migrants at any time and the proliferation of false passports. Abaaoud previously had boasted of slipping away from last January’s Verviers raids, which thwarted a terror plot and resulted in two fellow jihadis being killed.

The deaths and arrests have barely assuaged the tidal wave of fear that has engulfed the French capital since Friday when seven suicide bombers killed 132 people across Paris. The high state of tension has paralysed the city and residents are still not confident that the police have identified everyone involved.

More than 115,000 troops have surrounded the capital over the past few days.

The initial exchange of fire and explosions at Saint-Denis took place during the targeted raid on the third floor of the building on Rue du Cornillon near Place Jean Jaures, the heart of the historic area in the north of Paris.

One of 20 residents who were evacuated told television station France 24: “I was woken up and told to get out quickly and take refuge in the city hall.” He said he had seen a woman and two men on the stairs at the apartment block yesterday afternoon but had not thought anything of it.

One woman, Hayat, 26, had been leaving a friend’s apartment where she had spent the night when the shots rang out just after 4am. “I heard gunfire,” she said. “I could have been hit by a bullet. I never thought terrorists could have hid here.”

Another woman, Anna, said: “I have been told to stay indoors. We never thought about this; we don’t think about being near some ­terrorists.’’