January 2015 attacks: what role for the Belgian-Ardennes industry?

Drawing representing the fourteen defendants and their lawyers, the first day of the trial of the January 2015 attacks. BENOIT PEYRUCQ / AFP

Text by: Laura Martel

6 min

The trial of the January 2015 attacks continues in Paris.

This week will be mainly devoted to four defendants suspected of having agreed to seek and provide weapons to Amedy Coulibaly and the Kouachi brothers, and prosecuted for "criminal terrorist association".

The investigators refer to them as the “Belgian-Ardennes sector”.

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In the courtroom, the four men sit in the right boxing, side by side.

They expressed themselves a little, at the very beginning of the trial, when the personalities were examined.

The president also made them react to the testimonies of the victims: they then all condemned the attacks and assured that they were not terrorists.

But then, for more than a month, we hardly paid any attention to them, until this week.

► To read also: Trial of the attacks of January 2015: the mysteries of a "world of thugs"

On the Belgian side, there is first Metin Karasular, 50, garage owner in Charleroi, of Kurdish origin.

Already convicted of gambling and possession of weapons, the one who wears a different football shirt almost every day has, according to the Belgian police, links with the PKK and contacts in radical Islamist circles.

His boxing neighbor, 30-year-old friend and inveterate player, is Michel Catino, presented as his handyman.

At 68, the dean of the accused shares with his acolyte a peculiarity: to have until now regularly slept during the hearings.

The Ardennes, named after their region, are two in their thirties: the lean with a thin face, Abdelaziz Abbad, and the tall sturdy with a shaved head, Miguel Martinez, partners in a garage at the time of the facts.

Martinez has a long criminal record, mainly linked to narcotics, Abbad the heaviest: in addition to drugs, he was recently convicted of complicity in an attempted murder.

Disturbing coincidences

These four men are therefore suspected of having participated in supplying weapons to the terrorists.

But it should above all be remembered that most of Amedy Coulibaly's weapons have passed through another channel, the Lille, to which other defendants, already heard, would belong.

The origin of the

arsenal

could not be traced.

However, we know that Amedy Coulibaly was in contact with Chérif Kouachi and that his DNA was found on one of their weapons.

The killer of the Hyper Cacher undoubtedly transmitted them, think the investigators, of the weapons coming from the Belgian-Ardennes sector.

The investigation showed that the four men were in contact either with Coulibaly or with Ali Riza Polat, described as his " 

 ".

But as an investigator himself admits, " 

 " of a purchase of weapons which would have been used by terrorists via this channel, but " 

 ".

A bag of "rotten" weapons

Metin Karasular has acknowledged links with Amedy Coulibaly.

He has also presented himself to the police, but not for arms trafficking, which he denies.

He says he bought a car from Coulibaly and Polat.

Both were in his Belgian garage on January 3.

To recover part of the money from the sale according to the defendants;

probably also weapons, say the investigators.

Because among the clues raised, there is this handwritten note, attributed to Polat, which lists the weapons close to the killers' arsenal, found in the garage, near a paper bearing the number of Miguel Martinez;

telephony also shows many contacts between these men and trips from Abbad, with or without Martinez, to Grigny at Polat.

All three evoke today, after reversals, drug trafficking. 

On the weapons side, there are these two long rifles, which Metin Karasular claims to have " 

 ", which he says he sold to the Ardennes.

We are sure, however, they have nothing to do with the arsenal of terrorists.

►Also read: Trial of the January 2015 attacks: the media in question

And then there is this story of a bag of "

"

weapons

, in Abbad's words, which would come from Metin Karasular, would have passed through the intermediary of Willy Prevost and Ali Riza Polat, but would have been refused by Coulibaly and therefore returned to the North by Catino then stashed by the Ardennes.

A bag whose route therefore outlines an interesting circuit for investigators, that of this sector they suspect.

But they established that these rusty weapons ended up destroyed or in the water.

Abdelaziz Abbad, an important piece of the puzzle

So, even if the prosecution thinks that better weapons could have made the same journey and landed in the hands of Coulibaly and the Kouachi, they do not have formal proof, which the lawyer did not fail to mock. by Abdelaziz Abbad.

" 

 " quipped Master Apelbaum on Friday.

Yet his client is an important piece of the puzzle for investigators.

His city, Charleville-Mezière, is also the home of the widows of the Kouachi brothers.

He also went to college with the future wife of the eldest, Saïd.

Saïd, whom he had seen once, in 2006, he told investigators, to whom he also made a disturbing statement: seeing the photo of Saïd Kouachi after the attacks, he suddenly remembered a man who had solicited him for weapons at the end of 2014, a man who " 

 " like Saïd Kouachi.

For the prosecution, it is one more clue;

for Abbad's lawyer, all this is not convincing: " 

 " he said.

This “Belgian-Ardennes sector” component will therefore be studied in detail this week, starting this Monday with the questioning of Metin Karasular.

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