BRUSSELS (AP) – A Belgian judge is deciding whether to keep Mohamed Abrini and a half-dozen other suspects in the Paris and Brussels attacks in preventive custody.
Thursday’s hearing in Brussels comes after Abrini was arrested last week and charged in the March 22 attacks in Brussels, which left 32 dead, and the Nov. 13 attacks in Paris, which killed 130.
Authorities say Abrini acknowledged accompanying two suicide bombers who blew themselves up at Brussels Airport. France’s BFM television reported Abrini claimed to investigators he “wouldn’t hurt a fly.”
Abrini had close ties to the Paris attackers and is believed to have traveled to Syria and to have met with suspected terrorists in England.
Belgian and French authorities have detained dozens in the investigation into the attacks claimed by Islamic State extremists.