Salah Abdeslam, the main suspect in last year’s Paris attacks, has been wounded and arrested in a raid in Brussels, Belgian officials have said.
According to officials, Salah Abdeslam, who had been on the run since the November attacks, was wounded in the leg as police moved in on a flat in the Molenbeek area.
“We got him,” said Theo Francken, Secretary of State for Asylum and Migration.
Salah Abdeslam – one of Europe’s most wanted men – is a key suspect in the jihadist attacks in Paris which 130 people died.
Belgian PM Charles Michel had to urgently leave an EU-Turkey summit as details of the operation began to emerge.
The raid apparently continued late into the evening, as two more explosions were reported recently at the scene.
Salah Abdeslam’s fingerprints were found in a Brussels flat that was raided on March 15.
One man – identified as Algerian national Mohamed Belkaid and linked to the Paris attacks – was shot dead during the raid in the southern Forest suburb on March 15.
Officials said at the time they believed as many as two other suspects may have escaped.
Salah Abdeslam, a 26-year-old French national born in Brussels, had lived in Molenbeek before the November 13 attacks.
He is believed to have returned to Belgium immediately after the attacks, in which his brother Brahim blew himself up.
In January, Belgian police said they may have found a bomb factory in the Schaerbeek district of Brussels used as a hideout by Salah Abdeslam.
Police found traces of explosives, three handmade belts and a fingerprint of the suspect.
Salah Abdeslam has been the subject of a massive manhunt since the attacks, claimed by ISIS militants.
Officials have identified most of the people they believe to have carried out the assaults.
Most of the suspects either died during the attacks or were killed in subsequent police raids.
Parts of Brussels were sealed off for days after the Paris massacre amid fears of a major incident. A number of suspected attackers lived in the Belgian capital.
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