|
Listen to article
|
President Emmanuel Macron pledged Thursday that France would do everything to avoid a repeat of the jihadist attacks in Paris 10 years ago that took the lives of 130 people.
“Everything will be done to prevent any new attack and to ruthlessly punish those who would dare to attempt it,” he said.
The sole surviving member of the 10-person jihadist cell that staged the attacks, 36-year-old Salah Abdeslam, is serving life in jail.
The other nine attackers blew themselves up or were killed by police in the attack claimed by the Islamic State jihadist group.
US-backed forces in 2019 defeated the last remnants of the IS proto-state straddling parts of Syria and Iraq that inspired the Paris attacks.
But Macron warned of another form of jihadism that he called “internal, insidious, less detectable, less predictable”.
“No one can guarantee the end of attacks, but we can guarantee that for those who take up arms against France, the response will be uncompromising,” he said.
Macron said that France would continue to track jihadists at home and abroad.
“Eighty-five attacks have been foiled in 10 years, including six this year,” he added.
In other news, Ukraine’s energy and justice ministers resigned on Wednesday over their alleged involvement in a sweeping corruption scandal in the country’s energy sector.
Investigators alleged a key ally of President Volodymyr Zelensky orchestrated a $100-million kickback scheme to siphon off funds, triggering public anger at a time of widespread power outages caused by Russian attacks.
Ukraine has long been plagued by corruption and cracking down on graft is seen as a key requirement of its bid to join the European Union.
Zelensky earlier called for the resignation of his Justice Minister German Galushchenko, who investigators alleged received “personal benefits” in the scheme, as well as Energy Minister Svitlana Grynchuk.
Neither is known to have been charged and Grynchuk has not been mentioned as having profited from the scheme.
