PARIS (AFP) - The man who decapitated a teacher in France for showing cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed in class had been in contact with a Russian-speaking Islamist militant in Syria, a source close to the case said on Thursday (Oct 22).

Seven people have been charged with complicity after 18-year-old Chechen Abdullakh Anzorov killed Mr Samuel Paty last Friday, including two teenagers who helped him identify the teacher.

The identity of the terrorist militant in Syria has not yet been established, the source told AFP.

Le Parisien newspaper reported on Thursday that Anzorov's presumed contact had been located through an IP address traced back to Idlib, a city in north-western Syria.

Among the seven suspects charged were two teenagers who pointed out Mr Paty to Anzorov. They were on Wednesday charged with complicity in a terrorist murder, a judicial source said.

Prosecutors said earlier the pair, aged 14 and 15, were among a group of students who shared between €300 (S$480) and €350 offered by the killer to help find Mr Paty before he was murdered in a Paris suburb.