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Spanish Police Arrest Frenchman Who Gave Arms to Paris Supermarket Terrorist

Wednesday, April 13, 2016 9:12 am | 2 Minute Read

Members of the special French RAID forces secure the area for the visit by Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the Hyper Cacher kosher supermarket January 12, 2015 near the Porte de Vincennes in Paris, where four hostages were killed in a terror attack on Friday. Jewish schools and synagogues in France have been promised extra protection, by the army if necessary, after killings by Islamic militants in Paris, the head of the community's umbrella group said on Sunday after a meeting with the French President. REUTERS/Charles Platiau — Members of the special French RAID forces secure the area in front of the Hyper Cacher kosher supermarket, January 12, 2015, in Paris. (Reuters/Charles Platiau)

Spanish police have arrested a French man who allegedly supplied the arms used by Islamist terrorist Amedy Coulibaly to kill five people at a kosher supermarket in Paris in January 2015, Spain’s interior ministry said on Wednesday.

Antoine Denive, a 27-year-old from Sainte Catherine in France, was arrested on Tuesday in Rincon de la Victoria, a town close to Malaga on Spain’s southern coast, the ministry said in a statement. It was a joint operation with French police, it said.

Coulibaly stormed the supermarket a few days after two other terrorists shot 12 people at and near the offices of the Charlie Hebdo newspaper in Paris. He killed four Jews and a policewoman before being shot dead by police.

Before the attack, Coulibably spent time in Spain, Spain’s High Court said last year.

Denive fled France several weeks after the attack in Paris, the statement said, and made a new base for himself in Malaga, where he continued his illegal arms dealing using false documents. The ministry did not say if Denive was suspected of belonging to an Islamist terror group.

Spain’s High Court said on Wednesday Denive had denied selling arms to Coulibaly but said he was willing to be extradited to France. The court would send Denive to be tried in France unless there was another case against him in Spain, El Pais newspaper said.