VIDEO-France Attack Suspect Has 'Normal Family Life'

Police stand next to a black plastic sheet after the terror attack. More pictures of the scene....

The wife of a suspect in the deadly attack on a French factory - a short drive from Lyon - has insisted he has a "normal family life".

Authorities say Yassin Salhi, 35, who has been arrested, is the main focus of investigations after a man was decapitated and two people were hurt in an explosion at the site.

The headless body of a 55-year-old man - who was Salhi's boss at a local transportation company - was found lying near the car along with a knife.

Salhi, who lived in Lyon, was arrested at the factory trying to open a canister of acetone shortly after he drove a delivery van into gas canisters - causing the blast.

The suspect's wife - who has also been detained, along with his sister and another unidentified person - called French radio station Europe 1.

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"My heart is going to stop," she said before her arrest.

"I do not know what has happened. Have they arrested him?"

She said her husband went to work as a delivery driver at 7am and that she expected him home in the afternoon.

"I've been waiting for him," she said.

"My sister-in-law called up and said switch the telly on and look at the news. She was crying. My heart stopped. I couldn't understand it.

"We are normal Muslims. It is Ramadan. We have three kids and a normal family life.

"Who can I call to give me more information because here I do not understand?

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"I'm afraid to do anything."

Paris Prosecutor Francois Molins said the attacker was known to factory staff because he was a delivery driver who regularly visited the site.

Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said Salhi was investigated nine years ago for radicalisation and had links to the Salafist movement.

"He was investigated in 2006 for radicalisation, but (the probe) was not renewed in 2008. He had no criminal record," he said.

"This individual has links with the Salafist movement, but had not been identified as having participated in activities of a terrorist nature."

Salafism is the violent end of Wahhabism - the state religion of Saudi Arabia and an ultra-conservative interpretation of Islam. 

 

http://news.sky.com/story/1509052/france-attack-suspect-has-normal-family-life