Daily Times

WASHINGTON: The United States on Thursday added the suspected jihadist bombmaker said to have supplied the gangs behind the deadly attacks in Paris and Brussels to its terror blacklist.

French and Belgian authorities believe a militant known as Ahmad Alkhald provided suicide vests and explosives expertise before the November 13, 2015 attacks on a Paris concert, bars and football crowd that left 130 dead.

He is thought to have fled to Syria, but remained in contact with a gang that later carried out the March 22, 2016 bombings at Brussels airport and a metro station that killed 32 people. On Thursday, the United States added Alkhald to what is now a 32-strong list of senior figures in the so-called Islamic State group now dubbed “specially designated global terrorists.”

“A Syrian national, Alkhald traveled to Europe, where he helped plan the Paris attacks and manufacture the explosive belts used in that plot, which killed and injured hundreds of people, including a number of Americans,” the department said.

“Following his return to Syria shortly before the attacks in Paris, Alkhald continued to guide ISIS operatives in Europe on making the bombs used in the March 2016 Brussels attacks.” Alkhald’s false passport was used in Greece in September 2015, where he is thought to have arrived among refugees fleeing the conflict in Syria, before heading to Belgium.

French authorities say they found traces of his DNA on explosive vests used by Brahim Abdeslam – who blew himself up in a crowded Paris cafe – and his brother Salah, who abandoned his un-used. The US terror designation forbids Americans from conducting business with Alkhald and any assets he is found to possess in areas under US jurisdiction will be seized.

In the same announcement, the State Department blacklisted Abu Yahya al-Iraqi – also known as Iyad Hamed Mahl al-Jumaily – whom it said was a senior lieutenant of Islamic State group leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.