November 13 trial: the prosecution's indictments began on Wednesday

Europe 1 with AFP 7 p.m., June 8, 2022

"A normal trial for facts that are not"... At the trial of the November 13 attacks, the national anti-terrorist prosecutor's office began to take its requisitions on Wednesday, more than six years after this night of horror which "made irruption in the life of all French people".

"What will we remember from this hearing? What images? What words will remain?" Asked Advocate General Camille Hennetier, one of the three representatives of the anti-terrorism prosecution (Pnat), in her opening remarks.

Lots of gray areas to clear up

"Your verdict, of course. The names of the disappeared last September. The accounts of the victims, finally, incontestably the cruelty of the terrorists who shoot piecemeal and finish off certain people with delight", she continued with a your solemn.

"This trial is loaded with symbols, hope, expectations and questions," admitted Ms. Hennetier before getting to the heart of the case.

"To this extraordinary drama responded an extraordinary investigation (...) with the task of answering political, sociological, human questions", she continued.

However, "there are still gray areas. On the accused. On the facts. What were the targets planned for Mohamed Abrini and Salah Abdeslam?", She asked before emphasizing: "All these questions that tap have answers and those answers are in the box. Most of the defendants know. They know everything and have never spoken and probably never will answer ".

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After nine months of hearing, "we are going to offer you keys to reading", she assured, before starting to "reconstitute the puzzle" of these jihadist attacks.

Three days of interrogation

Regarding Salah Abdeslam, the only surviving member of the commandos, "he was not content to help, he participated" in the attacks, this "unique, coordinated operation, in which all the members of the group were interchangeable", she said before giving the floor to her colleague Nicolas Braconnay.

He began by addressing the "birth of the terrorist project" in the Iraqi-Syrian zone, with this "common dream: to attack France".

According to the plan of requisitions announced by Camille Hennetier, the magistrates will then discuss the organization of the attacks, "the nightmare of November 13", then finally its consequences.

In turn and for three days, they will have to demonstrate what they believe are the responsibilities of each of the 20 accused - six of them, including five senior officials of the Islamic State organization presumed dead in Syria, are tried in their own right. absence.

It is only Friday that they will claim sentences against them.

Twelve defendants on the stand

Twelve defendants face life imprisonment, including Salah Abdeslam, the only surviving member of the commandos who sowed death at the Stade de France, on the Parisian terraces, and in the Bataclan concert hall.

Mutic during the investigation, the 32-year-old Frenchman answered questions during the trial, but his "truth" struggled to convince the prosecution.

It was "out of humanity" and not "out of cowardice", he explained, that he himself did not kill, renouncing to activate his explosive belt in a bar in the 18th arrondissement.

Abdeslam cried at the start of the trial

The man who presented himself as an "Islamic State fighter" at the start of the trial finally shed tears during his last speech a few months later.

"I ask you to hate me in moderation", he prayed to the survivors and relatives of the victims, asking for their "pardon".

The prosecution, which has always preferred the thesis of a malfunction of his belt, confronted Salah Abdeslam with his contradictions during his interrogations.

Hard to believe finally, while the commandos of the Stade de France, the terraces and the Bataclan were all composed of three men, that Salah Abdeslam operates "all alone", he who unlike the others had never gone to train in Syria .

The verdict expected on June 29

In addition to the main defendant who incurs incompressible life imprisonment - an extremely rare sanction which makes any adjustment of sentence very difficult - the Advocates General will request against Mohamed Abrini, "the man in the hat" of the Brussels attacks who was also "planned" for the 13 -November and the "good friends" who helped Salah Abdeslam during his escape.

Some, like the accused Farid Kharkhach, who made false papers "without knowing" that they were intended for the jihadist cell, or Yassine Atar, who swears to be linked to the file only because he is the brother of the sponsor of the Osama Atar attacks, hope that the proceedings have changed the prosecution's mind.

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After the requisitions, the floor will be given to the defense from June 13.

The verdict is expected on June 29.