Sentence handed down to Charlie Hebdo attacker: He claimed he was innocent

A terrorist attack was carried out on the Charlie Hebdo magazine building in Paris, the capital of France, in January 2015. One of the attackers, Peter Cherif, has been sentenced to life imprisonment by the court where he was being tried.

Cherif had been on trial at the Special Assize Court in Paris since September 16 on charges of participating in the 2015 Charlie Hebdo attack.

The 42-year-old Cherif was accused of joining the terrorist organization Al-Qaeda in Yemen between 2011 and 2018, providing training to Cherif Kouachi, who carried out the Charlie Hebdo attack, to enable him to commit the act, and kidnapping 3 French humanitarian aid workers in 2011 and holding them for more than 5 months.

Finding these charges to be justified, the court sentenced Cherif to life in prison. It was stated that the court handed down this sentence taking into account the severity of the charges against Cherif and the level of danger posed by the defendant.

While Cherif admitted to acting as an interpreter during the period when the 3 French humanitarian aid workers were kidnapped, he maintained that he had no role in the Charlie Hebdo attack.

Before and after the attacks in January 2015, Charlie Hebdo magazine had published offensive cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad. In the attacks carried out on the Charlie Hebdo magazine and a Jewish supermarket in Paris on January 7 and 9, 2015, 17 people lost their lives. The terrorist organization Al-Qaeda claimed responsibility for the attack.

A total of 14 people, 3 of them in absentia, were tried in 2020 in connection with the attacks. The court had handed down sentences ranging from 4 years to life imprisonment to the 14 defendants, including the brothers Cherif and Said Kouachi.

Peter Cherif

News Source: AA