Weapons Used in Paris Terrorist Attacks Acquired Abroad: French Police

MOSCOW, January 13 (Sputnik) – The terrorists, responsible for killing 17 people in Paris, acquired weapons outside of the country, a French police representative announced on Tuesday.

French officials have launched an investigation to identify the group that financed the terrorist attacks. According to Christophe Crepin, a French police union spokesman, the arms were imported from abroad by a well-organized terrorist network, as reported by AP.

On Tuesday, a Bulgarian prosecutor stated that they recently arrested a French man, who appears to have had connections to one of the Kouachi brothers, responsible for carrying out the Charlie Hebdo attack. Fritz-Joly Joachin, 29, was apprehended on January 1, as he was attempting to enter Turkey. He is suspected of having links to a terrorist group and abducting his 3-year-old son, whom he had illegally taken out of France.

The regional prosecutor for Bulgaria's southern province of Haskovo, Darina Slavova, said that Joachin "met with Kouachi several times at the end of December."

However, Belgian newspaper HLN reports, that weapons used by Kouachi brothers were purchased in Brussels for €5,000.

A series of terrorist attacks in Paris began on January 7, 2015 when two gunmen, identified as brothers Said and Cherif Kouachi, stormed the editorial office of satirical Charlie Hebdo magazine and killed 12 people.

The magazine is well-known for publishing satirical articles and cartoons, deriding Islam and other religions. A caricature of the Prophet Muhammad, which is assumed to have caused outrage among radical Islamist groups, is expected to appear again Wednesday, this time on the cover of the magazine.

The planned release raises concerns that a new Muhammad cartoon may have unpredictable consequences and spark radical sentiment again.