Mother of Bataclan terrorist goes on trial in Paris for financing terrorism

The mother of one of the 2015 Bataclan concert hall attackers has gone on trial in Paris, accused of “financing terrorism”.

Fatima Hajji is accused of sending more than €13,000 to her son and his partner while they were in Iraq and Syria, between 2014 and 2015.

Hajji’s son — Foued Mohamed Aggad — was one of three suicide bombers who stormed the Paris theatre during the November 2015 terror attacks.

The money had been sent to him while he was “expressing his participation in combat and his desire to die as a martyr”, prosecutors say.

Aggad’s partner Hajira Belkhir is also being tried in absentia for “terrorist criminal association”. She is presumed dead.

Hajji had been due to appear before the Paris Criminal Court in November but was granted extra time to prepare her defence.

Prosecutors say that Aggad left France for left for Syria in December 2013 with other members of the so-called Strasbourg network.

He allegedly maintained regular contact with his mother and other family members in northeastern France.

“In his exchanges with his mother, he indicated that, if he were to return to France, it would only be to commit an attack,” investigators said.

Six of Aggad’s relatives — including his mother and aunt — were arrested in June as part of a national investigation into “financing terrorism”. Only Hajji was charged with any offence.

Her trial takes place as a separate landmark trial is underway in Paris into the 2015 terror attacks that killed 130 people.

Source: Euronews