Paris attacks: Man jailed for sheltering jihadists

A man who lent his flat to two jihadists involved in the November 2015 Paris attacks has been sentenced on appeal to four years in prison.

Jawad Bendaoud, 32, was accused of harbouring Abdelhamid Abaaoud and Chakib Akrouh following the killings, the BBC reported.

He denied knowing they were attackers. He was cleared at the trial in 2018, but prosecutors immediately appealed.

The co-ordinated suicide bombing and mass shootings around Paris killed 130 people and injured hundreds more.

The Islamic State group said that it was behind the attacks on the national stadium, bars and restaurants in the city, as well as the Bataclan concert venue on November 13, 2015.

Bendaoud, a drug dealer and small-time criminal, was sentenced on Friday.

The verdict by the Paris Court of Appeal comes after the prosecution successfully argued that Bendaoud had harboured criminals at his flat in Saint Denis, in the north of the French capital.

Abaaoud, a Belgian national, is believed to have been the ringleader of the attacks, and was killed in a police raid on the Saint Denis flat on November 18, 2015. His accomplice Akrouh blew himself up during the raid.

Bendaoud was mocked in France for pleading innocence as he was arrested on the same day.

"Someone asked me for a favour, I helped them out," he said at the time.

It was not immediately clear whether Bendaoud would appeal against Friday's guilty verdict.

--IANS

pgh/bg