Islamic State claims responsibility for Paris attacks: Hollande vows to strike back

The world’s most dreaded terror outfit, the Islamic State claimed responsibility for the terror attacks on Paris, ‘The City of Lights’. The attack took place on November 13 killing hundreds of people and they claimed responsibility a day later.

An online statement said eight militants armed with explosive belts and automatic weapons attacked carefully chosen targets in the ‘capital of adultery and vice’, including a soccer stadium where France was playing Germany, and the Bataclan concert hall, where an American rock band was playing, and ‘hundreds of apostates were attending an adulterous party’. The statement added that France and its supporters ‘will remain at the top of the list of targets of the Islamic State’.

Blaming the carnage on the Islamic State France’s President Francois Hollande vowed to strike back. The French police were working to identify the potential accomplices. Though the statements did not provide the nationalities or other information about the attackers, reports of police finding the passport of one of the terrorists from Syria were reported. Several suspects linked to the terror act have also been arrested in Belgium.

The arrests in Belgium came after a car with Belgian license plates was seen close to the Bataclan concert hall, where many people were killed. Koen Geens, French Justice Minister said “there were arrests relating to the search of the vehicle and person who rented it”, saying that the number of people detained was ‘more than one’.

Pointing towards local support for the attack, Mr Hollande had said, “the attacks were an ‘act of war’ that had been “prepared, organised and planned from abroad’ with assistance from within France.” The latest attacks in Paris have been compared to the 26/11 terror attacks in Mumbai.

France has been a target of terror attacks of late, with the most recent one being in January, when gunmen stormed the offices of Charlie Hebdo, a satirical magazine that had published caricatures of Prophet Muhammad deemed offensive to Muslims, and killed 12 people.

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