Tried since Monday before the Special Assize Court in Paris, notably for his potential involvement in the Charlie Hebdo attack in January 2015, French jihad veteran Peter Cherif indicated on Tuesday, September 17, that he refused to speak.
During this second day of hearing, the accused was invited by the president of the assize court to speak about his life. “I do not wish to speak, Madam President,” replied Peter Cherif, after removing his surgical mask. On Monday, during the first day of hearing, he had declared that he did not recognize the facts of which he was accused.
Charlie Hebdo attack at the heart of debates
The 42-year-old jihadist is being tried by the specially composed criminal court for criminal terrorist association between 2011 and 2018, the period of his presence in Yemen within Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). He is also appearing for the organized kidnapping in 2011, for more than five months, of three French nationals, members of the NGO Triangle Génération Humanitaire.
But it is above all his potential involvement in the massacre committed in Paris in the offices of Charlie Hebdo by the brothers Chérif and Saïd Kouachi on January 7, 2015, fiercely debated during the investigation, which should be at the heart of the trial.
The investigating judges believe that he “facilitated the integration into AQAP of one of the Kouachi brothers, most likely Chérif”, and that he was “aware” of the “mission” to carry out an attack in France entrusted to his childhood friend during a short stay in Yemen in the summer of 2011.
Heard in the fall of 2020 as a witness during the trial of the January 2015 attacks, committed in particular by the Kouachi brothers before they were shot dead by the police, and which left a total of 17 dead, he assured that he had “nothing to do” with these attacks, before remaining silent.
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