Authorities search for link to terror groups

Combined dispatches

As French police and security forces scoured the country for the two brothers suspected of massacring 12 people at the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo, intelligence officials in Europe and the United States were conducting a search of their own — for evidence that would link the two to international terrorist organizations.

French officials told the intelligence services of two neighboring countries that they believed the two suspects, Cherif Kouachi and his brother Said, had recently traveled to Syria, where they’d fought with jihadist groups. But the French alert, distributed throughout Europe’s no-visa-required travel zone, offered no specifics on when the brothers supposedly traveled to or from Syria, and American officials, for one, were said to doubt the accuracy of the information.

“We’re assuming that the French are basing this on intelligence, but they have yet to specifically share it, as one assumes they’re pretty busy hunting these guys down right now,” said one European intelligence official who did not have permission to speak to the news media.

The French manhunt for the two brothers continued late into a second night Thursday, with as many as 88,000 police scouring an area 50 miles north of the capital.

The manhunt focused on the towns of Villers-Cotterets, Longpont and Corcy after a gas-station attendant said the two men had robbed him earlier Thursday, stealing food and gas.

French news reports said the brothers were still driving a gray Renault Clio that they had hijacked Wednesday in Paris after they abandoned their black Citroen getaway car. According to the reports, the gas-station attendant told authorities the two men were keeping their weapons, including AK-47s and rocket-propelled grenade launchers, visible in the back of the car.

Police found the national identity card of one of the brothers, reportedly Said, in the abandoned getaway car.

There were, however, no further reports of sightings of the brothers. Though media reports spoke of “a tightening noose,” police offered no evidence that an arrest was imminent.

Earlier Thursday, French police called the fatal shooting of a policewoman Thursday morning in a Paris suburb an act of terrorism, but there was no indication of a direct link between that attack and the Wednesday assault on the offices of Charlie Hebdo, though the attacker was dressed similarly to the suspects in Wednesday’s killings.

One day after what’s being called the worst terrorist attack in modern French history, the details of the murder spree became a bit clearer. Police are clearly focusing on the two brothers, one of whom was convicted in 2008 and sentenced to prison for recruiting youths to join extremist Islamist groups and fight in Iraq.

According to French news reports, French security services had both brothers on their radar and had been closely monitoring the actions of Cherif this past summer. But, they said, they had no indication that an attack was being planned.