French arrest 2 suspected of selling guns to Paris attacker
PARIS -- The Paris prosecutor's office says two people have been arrested on suspicion of helping provide guns to the man who attacked a kosher supermarket in January.
The man and woman were arrested Tuesday in Lille, northern France, nearly a year after the attacks on the Charlie Hebdo newspaper and kosher store left 17 people dead, the prosecutor's office said. The store attacker, Amedy Coulibaly, killed four people inside the market, and separately a policewoman, before dying in a shootout with police.
Coulibaly said he was acting on behalf of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).
The prosecutor's office confirmed that one of those arrested is Claude Hermant, an acknowledged mercenary, while the other is his partner.
CBS Radio News correspondent Elaine Cobbe reports that Hermant was already in custody on arms trafficking charges, and has reportedly been well-known for several years as a supplier of repurposed weapons.
French media were reporting that five of the guns used by Coulibaly in the supermarket siege were purchased from Hermant, but it remained unclear he was aware of their intended purpose the sales were apparently handled via intermediaries.