Four charged in Paris over failed assassination plot targeting Algerian dissident

Four young men aged between 19 and 22 have been formally indicted and detained in Paris under suspicion of participating in a failed assassination plot targeting exiled Algerian dissident and journalist Hichem Aboud, according to a report by French left-wing paper Liberation, released on the 24th of May. The anti-terrorist judicial investigation, officially opened by the National Anti-Terrorist Prosecutor’s Office, focuses on a disrupted “hit contract” planned in the northern city of Roubaix.

According to judicial sources, three of the suspects face charges of attempted murder in an organised gang in connection with a terrorist enterprise. The fourth suspect has been indicted for complicity in the attempted murder and criminal terrorist association. The targeted individual, Hichem Aboud, is a well-known opposition figure and journalist who has long been a vocal critic of the Algerian government and currently resides in France.

The discovery of the plot was accidental. Investigators stumbled upon the active contract on Aboud’s life while investigating a completely separate criminal case involving a museum robbery near Lyon.

By analysing encrypted communication networks on the Signal messaging app, police traced the conspiracy to a localised hit squad. The group had received explicit orders to kill, along with Aboud’s home address in Roubaix, for an agreed-upon sum of €10,000 intended for the designated shooter. The plot ultimately failed because the hit squad discovered that their target was not at his residence when they arrived to execute the contract.

A fifth individual was initially detained and questioned by the General Directorate for Internal Security (DGSI) but has since been released without charges at this stage of the proceedings. 

This targeted contract underscores the safety risks facing Algerian media professionals. According to Reporters Without Borders a pattern of police interrogations, pre-trial detentions, and heavy prison sentences are used by the Algerian government to silence journalists who report on corruption or protests.

Libération, AFP, RSF, Maghrebi.org