Page 8 - ARUBA TODAY

A8 WORLD NEWS
Monday 20 March 2017

Autopsy to learn if Paris airport attacker was intoxicated

JOHN LEICESTER and a cousin also were re-
Associated Press leased later Sunday.
PARIS (AP) — French of- In a news conference late
ficials completed an au- Saturday, Molins said Bel-
topsy Sunday to determine gacem called his father
whether a suspected Is- and brother early that
lamic extremist was drunk morning, minutes after he
or high on drugs when he fired bird shot at a police
took a soldier hostage at traffic patrol, injuring an
Paris’ Orly Airport and was officer in the face, to say
shot dead by her fellow that he’d made a stupid
patrolmen. mistake.
The suspect, Ziyed Ben Bel- “He called me at seven,
gacem, stopped at a bar eight in the morning and
in the wee hours Saturday said, ‘there you go, Papa.’
morning, around four hours He was extremely angry,
before he first fired bird even his mother couldn’t
shot at traffic police. Then, understand him,” the man
90 minutes later, he at- identified as the father said
tacked the military patrol on Europe 1. “He told me,
at Orly, causing panic and ‘I ask for your forgiveness.
the shutdown of the French I’ve screwed up with a
capital’s second-biggest gendarme.’”
airport. A member of the RAID, (Research, Assistance, Intervention and Deterrence), France’s elite police The 39-year-old French-
A subsequent police force, patrols at Orly airport, south of Paris. Soldiers at Paris’ busy Orly Aiport shot and killed a man man had a long criminal
search of his flat found who wrestled one of their colleagues to the ground and tried to steal her rifle Saturday, officials record, with multiple jail
cocaine, Paris prosecutor said. terms for drugs and rob-
Francois Molins said. Blood (AP Photo/Kamil Zihnioglu) bery offences.
samples taken during Sun- Molins said Belgacem
day’s autopsy were to be man identified as the sus- prayer. He drank. But under The Paris prosecutor’s of- was out on bail, banned
screened for drugs and al- pect’s father said Belga- the effects of alcohol and fice, which is in charge of from leaving France and
cohol, the prosecutors’ of- cem wasn’t a practicing cannabis, this is where one the probe, said Sunday obliged to report regularly
fice said. Muslim and drank alcohol. ends up,” said the father. that Belgacem’s father was to police, having been
In an interview Sunday with “My son was never a ter- Europe 1 did not give his released from police cus- handed preliminary charg-
French radio Europe 1, a rorist. He never attended name. tody overnight. His brother es for robberies in 2016.q
Israeli coalition crisis raises threat of new elections

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel’s ing Likud party regarding all did not seem favorable as parting on a weeklong visit siders biased against him.
prime minister backed out media regulation matters. hoped to his administration. to China, Netanyahu said Netanyahu recently con-
of an agreement to estab- The conflict centers on the Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon’s insistence was firmed for the first time that
lish a new broadcasting fate of the struggling state- Kahlon, head of the centrist “unacceptable” and there he called an early election
authority Sunday, creating run Israel Broadcasting Au- Kulanu party, insists the cor- was no need for the new in 2015 to block legislation
a coalition crisis with one of thority. Netanyahu initially poration start broadcasting corporation to be estab- aimed at curtailing the dis-
his key partners that could ordered it shut down and next month as planned. lished when the current au- tribution of Israel Hayom,
lead to early elections.Ben- replaced with a new cor- The crisis has sparked spec- thority could be reformed. a free daily financed by
jamin Netanyahu insisted poration, only to reverse ulation that the coalition Netanyahu has long tried to billionaire backer Sheldon
his coalition partners were course once the emerging could fall apart, and new curb his many detractors in Adelson that largely serves
required to side with his rul- personnel of the new body elections called.Before de- the media, which he con- as his mouthpiece. q