Salah Abdeslam tells police he 'wanted to blow himself up' at Paris stadium
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Belgian lawyer Sven Mary leaves the judicial police headquarters after his meeting with Salah Abdeslam on March 19, 2016.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Abdeslam's arrest in the gritty Molenbeek neighbourhood was hailed by European and US leaders, while French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said it dealt a "major blow" to ISIS militants operating in Europe.
The 26-year-old Abdeslam, who had been on the run for four months, and an alleged accomplice who was captured with him were both treated at a Brussels hospital for gunshot injuries sustained in the raid.
In Paris on Saturday, Hollande met with key cabinet ministers and security officials to discuss the next steps in the probe into the Nov 13 attacks.
"The operations of the past week have enabled us to incapacitate several individuals who are clearly extremely dangerous and totally determined," Cazeneuve said after the meeting.
Hollande, who was in Brussels for an EU summit when the raid took place, described Abdeslam as "directly linked to the preparation, the organisation and, unfortunately, the perpetration of these attacks".
The Belgian press said Abdeslam's capture restored the country's honour, tarnished by perceived intelligence and police blunders before and after the attacks, which appear increasingly to have been planned and coordinated in Brussels.
Former small-time criminal Abdeslam is believed to be the last surviving member of the 10-man jihadist team that carried out the attacks.
He apparently fled by car to Brussels the day after the rampage, and is believed to have spent much if not all of the subsequent months in and around the city.
Prosecutors said special forces raided a house in Molenbeek on Friday because of evidence found in an operation elsewhere in Brussels on Tuesday, in which another Paris-linked suspect died in a gun battle.
Two other suspects escaped amid intense speculation that one of them might have been Abdeslam.
Abdeslam's fingerprints was found at the scene of Tuesday's raid, which resulted in the second operation that led to his capture.
Investigators believe Abdeslam rented rooms in the Paris area to be used by the attackers and also hired one of the cars in which he drove the suicide bombers to the Stade de France before heading to the 18th arrondissement.
Several people have been arrested on suspicion of helping him after he fled Paris and his fingerprints were found in December at different Brussels apartments.
The ringleader of the attacks, ISIS member Abdelhamid Abaaoud, and attacker Bilal Hadfi, both dead, also had links to Molenbeek, which has been seen as a hotbed of Islamist radicalism for decades.
Abdeslam and his brother Brahim, who blew himself up during the Paris assault, had run a bar in the area until it was shut down by the authorities a few weeks before the attacks.
"We're glad (Abdeslam) didn't go... to Syria to be killed by an American drone," said Aurelia Gilbert, an employee of the Bataclan and a member of a victims' group.
"We are a democracy and there will be a trial," she said.
A lawyer for the Abdeslam family said relatives felt a "sense of relief" over his arrest because he was captured alive and the pressure to help find him has been lifted.
