Salah Abdeslam, Paris attacks suspect, refuses to speak at French court hearing - Action News
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Salah Abdeslam, Paris attacks suspect, refuses to speak at French court hearing

The last known survivor of the team that carried out last November's Paris attacks refused to talk during questioning Friday by anti-terror judges and the session ended abruptly.

Lawyer says client 'can't tolerate' 24-hour surveillance in prison cell

Journalists surround Frank Berton, lawyer of Salah Abdeslam, outside the courthouse after the arrival of the Paris attacks suspect at the main law court in Paris, France, on Friday. (Gonzalo Fuentes/Reuters)

The last known survivor of the team that carried out last November's Paris attacks refused to talk during questioning Friday by anti-terror judgesand the session ended abruptly.

Salah Abdeslam's lawyer, Frank Berton said his client invoked his right to silence.

Abdeslam, 26, had said last month he wanted to explain all. Berton told reporters that Abdeslam was disturbed by the 24-hour video surveillance in his maximum-security celland called the practice illegal.

"He can't tolerate being watched on video 24 hours a day," Berton said. "Psychologically that makes things difficult."

Salah Abdeslam is shown in an undated handout image made available by Belgium Federal Police. He was captured on March 18 after a four-month manhunt. (Belgium Federal Police via AP)

Friday was the first time Abdeslam was questioned since his extradition from Belgium last month. At that point, Berton said his client wanted to talk to investigators and explain his path to radicalization. It was unclear why the suspect changed his mind.

Lawyers for the victims and their families said they hadn't expected any sort of repentance fromAbdeslam, but authorities want more information about his activities prior to the attacks, according to freelance reporter Catherine Field.

"Abdeslam was criss-crossingEurope.He was in Greece, he was in Austria, in Hungary and Germany," Field told CBC News from Paris.

"He was meeting people, mixing in with different networks there. That is what the police want to know who was he mixing with? Who were the links between Paris, Brussels and the so-called IslamicState? Those are the key bits of this whole jigsaw that the police don't yet feel confident that they have."

Months on the run

Abdeslam, a French citizen of Moroccan origin, was handed a half-dozen preliminary terrorism charges after his transfer on April 27 from Belgium, where he was arrested after four months on the run.

He is the only suspect still alive believed to have played a direct role in the Nov. 13 bloodshed at a concert hall, stadium and Parisian cafes, which killed 130 people. The other attackers died in suicide bombings or under police fire.

Abdeslam's precise role in the attacks has never been clear. The Paris prosecutor has said he was equipped as a suicide bomber, but abandoned his plans and fled to Belgium, where he had grown up. Abdeslam's older brother blew himself up at a cafe during the Paris attacks.

Abdeslam was captured March 18 at a hideout near his childhood home in Brussels' Molenbeek neighbourhood. Four days later, suicide bombers detonated their explosives in the Brussels airport and metro, killing 32 people.

A French military task force secures the convoy transporting Paris attacks suspect Salah Abdeslam to the Palais de Justice. (Etienne Laurent/EPA)