French media are reporting that the Paris shooting suspects have said they are prepared to die as martyrs.
The two suspects Said and Cherif Kouachi are now fully surrounded by French police in an industrial building near Charles de Gaulle airport, in Dammartin-en-Goele.
One brother was convicted of terrorism charges in 2008, and survivors of the bloody assault on Charlie Hebdo said the attackers claimed allegiance to al Qaida in Yemen.
A senior US official said yesterday that the elder Kouachi had travelled to Yemen, although it was unclear whether he was there to join extremist groups such as al Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, which is based there.
The younger brother, Cherif, was convicted of terrorism charges in 2008 for his links to a network sending jihadis to fight American forces in Iraq.
Nine people, members of the brothers’ entourage, have been detained for questioning in several regions. In all, 90 people, many of them witnesses to the grisly assault on the satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo, were questioned for information on the attackers, French interior minister Bernard Cazeneuve said.
The minister confirmed reports that the men were identified by the elder brother’s ID card, left in an abandoned getaway car, a slip that contrasted with the seeming professionalism of the attack.
A third suspect, 18-year-old Mourad Hamyd, surrendered at a police station on Wednesday evening after hearing his name linked to the attacks. His relationship to the Kouachi brothers was unclear.
The Kouachi brothers – born in Paris to Algerian parents – were well-known to French counter-terrorism authorities. Cherif Kouachi, a former pizza deliveryman, had appeared in a 2005 French TV documentary on Islamic extremism.