FRANCE: Paris Attacks 'ringleader' Killed In Police Raid

The Islamic State jihadist suspected of orchestrating the Paris attacks was killed in a major police raid in the French capital, prosecutors confirmed Thursday, raising troubling questions about a breakdown in intelligence and European border security.

Abdelhamid Abaaoud, a Belgian of Moroccan origin linked to a series of extremist plots in Europe over the past two years, died in Wednesday's assault by police on an apartment in northern Paris.

The 28-year-old was thought to have been in Syria — where he had boasted of planning attacks on the West — and his presence in France will renew debate about Europe's border controls and monitoring of fighters returning from the war-torn country.

Confirmation that such a high-profile figure from the Islamic State (IS) group had slipped undetected into France prompted a sharp response from Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve, who demanded Europe step up its response to the terror threat.

He said Paris had received "no information" from other European countries about his arrival on the continent.

"It is urgent that Europe wakes up, organises itself and defends itself against the terrorist threat," Cazeneuve said.

Prime Minister Manuel Valls said some of the attackers had taken advantage of Europe's migrant crisis to "slip in" unnoticed and warned the cherished passport-free Schengen zone would be in danger if the bloc did not improve border controls.

Abaaoud was the subject of an international arrest warrant issued by Belgium -- where a court had in July sentenced him in absentia to 20 years in prison for recruiting jihadists for Syria.

But it was only three days after the Paris bloodbath that "intelligence services of a country outside Europe indicated they had knowledge of his presence in Greece", Cazeneuve said, without specifying which country.

Abaaoud was also checked by police at Cologne-Bonn airport on his way to Istanbul in early 2014, German officials said, but was allowed to go as they had no indication he should be stopped.

- Radical cousin -EU interior and justice ministers are to meet in Brussels on Friday where they will tighten checks on all travellers at the external borders of the 26-nation Schengen zone as an emergency measure.

At least 129 people were killed in the shootings and suicide bombings that targeted a concert hall, bars and restaurants and the Stade de France national stadium last Friday.

It was the second major attack in Paris in less than a year. In January, jihadist gunmen killed 17 people at Charlie Hebdo satirical magazine, on the streets and in a Jewish supermarket.

Abaaoud was involved in four out of six attack plots foiled in France this year, Cazeneuve said. Police are also probing links to a thwarted assault on a high-speed train from Amsterdam to Paris in August.

As the probe widened across Europe, Belgian police arrested nine people in Brussels, seven in raids linked to a suicide bomber who took part in the Paris attacks last Friday.

Italy was also hunting five suspects after an FBI tip-off about possible jihadist attacks on landmark sites.

Paris prosecutor Francois Molins said fingerprint analysis was used to identify Abaaoud's body, found riddled with bullets in the rubble of the shattered building in Saint-Denis following a seven-hour police siege.

Another body found after the ferocious shootout is thought to be that of Abaaoud's 26-year-old cousin Hasna Ait Boulahcen, who detonated an explosives vest.

Speaking to AFP before police raided a house northeast of Paris where Boulahcen had lived with her mother and siblings, her brother said she had become radicalised only around six months ago.

"She was unstable, she created her own bubble. She wasn't looking to study religion, I have never even seen her open a Koran," he told AFP.

"It's brainwashing," added her 58-year-old mother, with whom she had been living in the gritty Paris suburb of Aulnay-sous-Bois until a few weeks ago.

'IT'S CARNAGE'

Eight arrests were made in Wednesday's massive raid in Saint Denis, but another key suspect, Salah Abdeslam, remains unaccounted for.

Abdeslam is thought to be one of the only surviving members of the group of assailants behind the Paris attacks. His suicide-bomber brother Brahim Abdeslam blew himself up at a cafe without killing anyone.

Chilling CCTV footage has emerged in which a gunman can be seen pointing his weapon at a woman crouching under a table outside the café — but it jams, allowing her to flee.

A video has also emerged from the bloody scene outside La Bonne Biere restaurant just seconds after it came under fire, with bodies seen lying on the ground as people rushed to help the victims. "It's carnage", a voice can be heard saying off-camera.

French lawmakers on Thursday voted to extend an extraordinary package of security measures for three months as Valls warned of "the risk from chemical or biological weapons".

The measures include allowing police to carry weapons when they are off duty and use them in the event of an attack. French MPs also voted to let the government block websites and social media accounts promoting or inciting terrorist acts.

French President Francois Hollande also ordered French air strikes against IS jihadists be stepped up in Iraq as well as Syria.

TURKEY: Another Drowned Kid Found On Turkish Beach

Refugees pray on a highway In Turkey

A four-year-old Syrian girl's body has washed up on a beach in western Turkey, state media says, just weeks after images of drowned Syrian toddler Aylan Kurdi shook the world.

The yet-to-be identified girl was found lifeless on a beach in the Aegean town of Cesme in Izmir province after a boat carrying 15 Syrians to the Greek island of Chios sank.

It said the Turkish coast guard rescued the remaining 14 Syrians, including eight children, from the inflatable boat. The girl appeared to be the only casualty.

Harrowing pictures of three-year-old Syrian asylum seeker Aylan, whose body was found washed up on a Turkish beach after the boat carrying his family to the Greek island of Kos sank, caused an outpouring of emotion around the world.

The response pressured European leaders to step up their response to the migrant crisis.

But two weeks later EU members are still at odds over how to accommodate the tens of thousands of new arrivals.

Turkish deputy prime minister Numan Kurtulmus said on Friday the Turkish coast guard had rescued over 53,000 asylum seekers from stricken boats since the beginning of the year.

He said around 274 asylum seekers had lost their lives in Turkish waters this year seeking to leave the country by sea for Greece.

In another recent tragedy, 22 people who had left Turkey drowned on Tuesday when their wooden boat sank off Kos.

Asylum seekers have in recent days turned to Turkey's land borders with Greece and Bulgaria to avoid the sea voyage that has cost over 2,600 people their lives in the Mediterranean this year.

Several hundred asylum seekers spent a third day camped in and around the Turkish border city of Edirne, which lies 10 kilometres from the Greek border and is being promoted on social media as a safer route out of Turkey than sea journey in overcrowded dinghies.

Under an "open-door" policy championed by president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey has taken in 2.2 million Syrian asylum seekers since the conflict in Syria erupted in 2011.

Mr Kurtulmus said Turkey has so far spent almost $11 billion (6 billion euros) to provide for Syrian refugees.

International Organisation of Immigration says a record 473,887 asylum seekers crossed into Europe

A record 473,887 asylum seekers have crossed the Mediterranean to Europe so far this year, the International Organisation for Migration said on Friday, including at least 182,000 Syrians — almost 40 per cent of the total.

The total represents an increase of almost 9,000 from the total the Geneva-based agency gave on Tuesday. But the rate of increase has slowed.

On Tuesday, the IOM said the number of crossings had jumped by more than 32,000 since the previous Friday.

The EU's Eurostat statistics agency said the EU received 213,000 asylum applications from April to June this year, a jump of 85 per cent from the same period in 2014, with over one third coming from Syria or Afghanistan.

It said Germany had the highest number of new applicants, with more than a third of the total for the EU, while Hungary was the country that received the most asylum applications relative to its population size.

Applications from Kosovo, regarded as a "safe" country by most of the EU, dropped sharply in the period, from the top berth with 50,000 requests in the first quarter to just over 10,000 one quarter later.

Across the EU almost 600,000 applications were pending at the end of June, Eurostat said, with 52 per cent of those being processed in Germany.

The European Union must know that Croatia will not become a migrant 'hotspot'. We have hearts, but we also have head.Croatia's prime minister, Zoran Milanovi

Croatia said it cannot and would not accept the burden of thousands of asylum seekers any longer, nor register or accommodate them.

Faced with an influx of more than 13,000 migrants in just over two days, prime minister Zoran Milanovic said on Friday he had called a session of Croatia's National Security Council and that it was time to deal with the problem in a different way

"We cannot register and accommodate these people any longer," he told a news conference.

"They will get food, water and medical help, and then they can move on. The European Union must know that Croatia will not become a migrant 'hotspot'. We have hearts, but we also have heads."

In response, Slovenia accused Croatia on of breaking the rules of the EU and the Schengen zone of border-free travel.

Interior ministry state secretary Bostjan Sefic said Slovenia expected around 1,000 asylum seekers to cross from Croatia in the next 24 hours.

Meanwhile, Dutch prosecutors said on Friday they had arrested two Syrians suspected of operating a large people-smuggling ring that brought hundreds of Syrian refugees into Europe.

Following a year-long investigation, Dutch authorities arrested a 35-year-old Syrian man living in the southern city of Eindhoven as well as his 26-year-old cousin.

Europol, Europe's police agency, is tracking as many as 30,000 suspected people smugglers who are taking advantage of large flows into the continent of asylum seekers escaping conflict in the Middle East and Africa.
Vatican takes in first Syrian refugee family

Responding to a call from Pope Francis for every Church parish to house refugees, the Vatican City said on Friday it had taken in a family that had fled the war in Syria.

The family — a father, mother and their two children — came from Damascus and are Melkite Greek Catholics, a Christian church with close ties to the Roman Catholic Church.

The Vatican said in a statement the family, which was not named, arrived in Italy on September 6, the day Pope Francis made his appeal for European parishes to open their doors to refugees. The four Syrians have since asked for asylum.
Journey in search of a better life

In a special report, ABC correspondents Mary Gearin, Barbara Miller and Sophie McNeill follow some asylum seekers on their long path through Europe.

"According to the law, for the first six months following the request for asylum those seeking international protection cannot work," the Vatican said.

"During this time, they will be helped and accompanied by the Parish of Santa Anna."

The Vatican City, a micro state which sits in the heart of Rome, contains two parishes — Santa Anna and St. Peter's Basilica.

The Vatican said it could not yet provide any information about a second family that is expected to be housed by the St Peter's administration.

Some parishioners have been openly hostile to the idea of welcoming in Muslims.

Monks in a village in Slovakia had to withdraw an offer to house Christian Syrian refugees after locals baulked at the idea.

The vast majority of Syrians are Muslims, but its small Christian community is one of the oldest in the world, making up an estimated 10 per cent of the population before the outbreak of the Syrian unrest in 2011.

According to its website, the Melkite Greek Catholic Church had some 150,000 members in Damascus in 2010. It is not clear how many have stayed in the city.