Sir: Mohamed Merah, a French-born self-confessed fanatic who killed seven people, including three children, in a shooting spree in southwest France, stirred a sharp controversy when the French authorities claimed that the offender underwent a radicalisation process during a trip to Afghanistan, bordering the tribal areas of Pakistan in November 2011. The French national of North African origin was killed in a police commando raid in Toulouse at the end of the 32-hour siege of his house on March 24, 2012. In the shocking aftermath of the Toulouse attacks, the French as well as international news organisations were quick to trace Merah’s training excursion in Pakistani militant camps. Merah, 23 years old, had a very dubious and capricious history. He was a proclaimed offender who was arrested on several occasions because of his involvement in drugs, thefts and violent crimes. However, he was hired as an informant and sent to Afghanistan to spy upon the al Qaeda senior leadership in the tribal belt by the DCRI, a French domestic intelligence agency. A former intelligence chief Yves Bonnet has also confirmed that Merah was on the payroll of DCRI before this grisly incident. “He was known to the DCRI, not especially because he was an Islamist, but because he had a correspondent in domestic intelligence,” Bonnet told La Dépêce newspaper. Over a period of time, Merah developed severe differences with the French secret intelligence agency. In a reactionary move, Merah displayed his violent nature in a shooting spree on the children of a school in southern France. After the tragic events, in order to cover up their links with Merah, the French intelligence authorities put him down as a radical Islamist who avenged the killing of Palestinian children and punished France for sending troops to Afghanistan. In this way, the DCRI got rid of their own informant. ANSAR MEHBOOB Rawalpindi