Belgian police were questioning 13 suspects on Friday detained during raids against an Islamist group they feared planned to attack police and two other people were held inFrance, state prosecutors said.
A spokesman told a news conference there was still no apparent link to last week’s Islamist attacks in Paris and the identities of two gunmen killed during one of the raids on Thursday, in the eastern town of Verviers, had yet to be confirmed.
As well as guns, including four AK-47 assault rifles, and explosives, police uniforms were found in the apartment at Verviers, spokesman Eric Van Der Sypt said, adding: “This group was on the point of carrying out terrorist attacks aiming to kill police officers in the streets and in police stations.”
Asked about a report of a plan to behead a policeman – an echo of Islamist violence elsewhere, including an attack on an off-duty soldier in London in 2013 – he declined comment. He said there had been plans for attacks across Belgium.
He would not say where in France the two suspects there were detained at the request of the Belgian authorities.
Some of the suspects had recently returned from Syria.
REUTERS