Five alleged Islamic terrorists arrested in Paris this week were planning to assassinate the city’s leading Muslim cleric, it emerged today.
All of the men, who are French passport holders, are believed to have returned from fighting British and American troops alongside the Taliban in Afghanistan.
The murder plot against Dalil Boubakeur, rector of the French capital’s main mosque, was only foiled at the eleventh hour thanks to a tip-off.
Secret intelligence officers were able to move in on two Frenchmen of Algerian descent as they arrived at Charles de Gaulle airport on Monday night from Egypt.
Armed police arrested three other men from similar backgrounds in flats in the Paris suburbs on Tuesday morning.
‘These were five major arrests,’ said Bernard Squarcini, director of France’s Internal Intelligence agency, the DCRI.
‘All were linked to a major inquiry into jihadists returning from the Afghanistan-Pakistan border area and threatening to assassinate the rector of the Paris Mosque, Dalil Boubaker.’
Mr Boubaker has been under armed guard since last month after radicals issued threats following the introduction of a burka ban in France – a measure which many see as overtly anti-Muslim.
Osama Bin Laden, the terrorist mastermind behind atrocities including the 9/11 attacks on America in 2001, also released a recorded video message calling for French people to be killed unless the country withdraw its troops from the war in Afghanistan.
Security has also been stepped up around leading public figures in France, including Carla Bruni, who is seen as an assassination target.
Intelligence chief Mr Squarcini said the five men were seen as important figures in the current ‘global threat’ against France.
All are thought to have been part of a jihad network based in the tribal areas of Pakistan which regularly heads into Afghanistan to fight coalition forces.
Mr Boubaker welcomed the arrests saying : ‘Unfortunately men of peace are threatened all too often.
‘Thanks to our system we can protect freedom of thought and freedom of expression and have the freedom to live together in this dangerous world.’
The foiled plot illustrates the growing rift between Islamic moderates and those prepared to kill and maim in the name of their religion, said Mr Boubaker.
France has been on heightened terrorist alert since the summer, when there were bomb scares at major tourist attractions including the Eiffel Tower.