Hollande calls assault terrorism

By Nicholas Vinocur

A decapitated body found on the site of French gas plant explosion, and a suspect has been arrested.

President François Hollande called an assault Friday on a French gas canister factory a terrorist attack, resulting the arrest of a man who drove onto the site carrying an Islamic State flag.
A decapitated head covered in Arabic writing was found at the Air Products factory near the town of Saint-Quentin-Fallavier, Hollande said from Brussels, where he was attending a European Council summit. The body of the decapitated man was found several meters away.

“This attack was in a vehicle driven by one person, perhaps accompanied by another,” Hollande said. “The individual suspected of committing this attack has been arrested and identified.”
Hollande said he was returning to Paris, where he planned to hold an emergency defense council meeting Friday afternoon. Hollande interrupted a meeting early Friday with Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras when the news of the terror attack broke. He then watched it unfold with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, according to a French press official.
“In these moments, you have to express solidarity towards the victim. Leaders at the council also expressed their solidarity this morning. Everybody remembers what happened in our country,” Hollande added. “Emotion is not the only response,” but also “action, deterrence, and prevention.”
Watch Hollande’s press statement:
The arrest of the 30-year-old suspect, who was known to the French DGSi external security services, came about an hour after a powerful explosion rocked the site. French anti-terrorism authorities have opened an investigation into the attack.
Police sources told Le Monde newspaper they believed two men may have been behind the attack, the second one being among those injured in the explosion. The arrested suspect was being questioned by police and had given them his identity, which has not been made public, the paper said.
Prime Minister Manuel Valls raised the terror alert level for all “sensitive sites” in the area, which is near the city of Grenoble in the Rhone-Alpes region. Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve has arrived on the scene at the Air Products factory, where police have cordoned off the area around the explosion.
About 40 employees were evacuated from the site, French media reported.

Far-right French leader Marine Le Pen was among the first politicians to react publicly to the attack.

“The grand statements must now stop. The marches, the slogans and the emotional communication must give way to action,” she said in a statement.

She called for national borders to be re-established, suspected radical Islamists to be expelled from the country, mosques placed under surveillance and more funding for security services.

In January, France suffered its worst terrorist attack in decades when two gunmen stormed the offices of the Charlie Hebdo satirical weekly and killed ten people for over what they said was an insulting portrayal of the Muslim prophet Mohammed.
Seventeen people were killed in a series of attacks, which ended when police stormed two sites where gunmen had holed up with hostages.
Hundreds of thousands of French people joined “I am Charlie” rallies across France to express support for the publication. The French government followed up with a new surveillance law, approved by parliament on Wednesday, that significantly expands its power to track suspected terrrorists.
The Brussels police department in charge of security at the European Council told POLITICO that law enforcement officials were taking the necessary measures to secure European leaders. The European institutions have been on alert ever since the Charlie Hebdo attack— the threat level for potential targets around Schuman has stayed at level three, with military personnel guarding the entrances of the institutions.
“At the moment, there is no change in the threat level,” said police commissioner Christian De Coninck.