Four to face possible charges over Paris attacks: prosecutor

PARIS - Agence France-Presse

New York city mayor Bill de Blasio lays a wreath of flowers at the kosher grocery where Amedy Coulibaly killed four people in a terror attack, in Paris, Tuesday Jan.20, 2015. AP Photo

Four men will appear before a judge in France on Jan. 20 to face possible charges of providing support to one of the Paris Islamist attackers, the prosecutors' office said.
      
The four men, aged 22, 25, 26 and 28, were among 12 people detained in police raids on Friday, a week after the jihadist attacks that left 17 people dead in and around Paris over the space of three days.
      
Three of the women detained in the raids were freed on Saturday and five people were released overnight Tuesday, the Paris prosecutors' office said.
      
The remaining four will later on Tuesday face an anti-terrorist judge who will decide whether to charge them with providing logistical support to one of the Paris attackers, Amedy Coulibaly.
      
Coulibaly took hostages at a kosher supermarket in eastern Paris on January 9 in a raid that left four dead. He is also suspected of shooting dead a policewoman the previous day just outside southern Paris.
      
He claimed to have acted in concert with Cherif and Said Kouachi, brothers who began the three days of Paris attacks on January 7 when they burst into the offices of the Charlie Hebdo satirical weekly, mowing down 12 people in revenge for cartoons lampooning the Prophet Mohammed.
      
The Paris attacks deeply shocked the country, prompting several million to pour onto the streets for rallies, and sparked an outpouring of international support for France.