Extremist vows terrorist attacks in Lausanne and Geneva

Last week, the newspaper Le Temps reported on mobile phone messages that suggest there were plans for terrorist attacks in Lausanne and Geneva.

One message, sent via Snapchat from the phone of a 28-year old man from Annemasse in France, read: “We are going to blow ourselves up in Lausanne and in a church in Geneva, see you in paradise, take care of my wife as I swear allegiance to the caliphate of Daesh.”

Known to French police, the radicalised man was questioned on 13 August outside a church in France during a baptism ceremony after he shouted: “Believe in god because you’re in danger”, and then “Allah Akbar” several times.

The day before, the man, who has an Algerian mother and a Turkish father, hastily married an unemployed French-Algerian woman, who lives near Paris with her two children, in a religious ceremony at a friend’s apartment in Geneva.

The woman, who was searched by French police near the French-Swiss border post of Thonex-Vallard, was found in possession of two guns that fire rubber bullets. Possession of such guns is illegal in France. She also had two mobile phones, one of which belonged to the 28-year old man.

The woman appeared before a judge in Thonon last Thursday and was given 6 months in prison and a 3-year suspended sentence. Her husband, confined to a prison hospital in Lyon and unable to travel to court for health reasons, was described by the judge “as a bomb waiting to go off who wasn’t far from taking action.”

The man, reportedly suffering from psychological problems, was in contact with Niçois Omar Diaby, a key jihadist recruiter, in June and July, according to investigators.

The 28-year old is rescheduled to appear in court in Thonon on 12 October.

More on this:
Le Temps article (in French) - Take a 5 minute French test now

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