ZCZC
BFF-06
FRANCE-ATTACKS-BELGIUM
Paris attacks suspect taken to hospital with appendicitis: source
PARIS, June 20, 2018 (BSS/AFP) -Salah Abdeslam the sole surviving member of a terror cell which carried out deadly attacks in Paris in 2015 was taken out of prison and driven under high security to hospital with appendicitis, a prison source said.
Abdeslam, a 28-year-old Belgian-born French national, was taken to a hospital 15 kilometres (nine miles) from his prison cell south of Paris, prison authorities said.
Abdeslam, who is of Moroccan descent, has been held in solitary confinement. He is the only living member of a terror cell who left 130 people dead in and around Paris in November 2015, the biggest atrocity of its kind on French soil for which the Islamic State group claimed responsibility.
In Neighbouring Belgium he and accomplice Sofiane Ayari, a 24-year-old Tunisian, have been sentenced to 20 years in prison for their part in a gunbattle with police in Brussels which led to their capture.
BSS/AFP/AU/08:05 hrs