SHARE
COPY LINK

TERRORISM

Posthumous wedding for gay French policeman killed by jihadist on Champs-Elysées

The partner of a gay policeman gunned down by a jihadist on Paris's Champs-Elysees avenue in April has married him posthumously, according to reports on Wednesday.

Posthumous wedding for gay French policeman killed by jihadist on Champs-Elysées
Photo: AFP

Former president Francois Hollande and Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo attended the wedding on Tuesday of the late Xavier Jugele and Etienne Cardiles.

Jugele, 37, was shot dead on April 20 while on duty on the famous Parisian avenue, three days before the first round of France's presidential election.

The law in France states that posthumous marriages are permitted when there are “significant grounds” and terror attacks fall into this category, according to the government's website.

It must also be demonstrated that the deceased had “unequivocal” desire to get married. If these grounds are met then the president can authorize the marriage by decree.

 

At a moving remembrance ceremony led by then president Hollande on April 25, Cardiles said the killer would “not have my hatred”, echoing the words of the husband of a victim of the November 2015 attacks in the French capital.

“I have no hatred, Xavier, because it is not like you and does not fit with what made your heart beat nor what made you a guardian of the peace,” he said.

Jugele was the fifth policeman slain by jihadists in attacks that have claimed more than 230 lives across France since January 2015.

Hollande posthumously made him a knight of the Legion d'Honneur, one of France's highest honours.

Shortly after Jugele's death it emerged that he had been among the first responders at the Bataclan theatre in Paris on November 13, 2015, where Isis gunmen massacred 90 concertgoers.

He returned to the venue a year later when it reopened for a concert by British star Sting, telling a BBC interviewer he wanted “to celebrate life and say 'no' to terrorism”.

TERRORISM

Italian police arrest Algerian wanted for alleged IS ties

Police in Milan said on Thursday they had arrested a 37-year-old Algerian man in the subway, later discovering he was wanted for alleged ties to Islamic State.

Italian police arrest Algerian wanted for alleged IS ties

When stopped by police officers for a routine check, the man became “particularly aggressive”, said police in Milan, who added the arrest took place “in recent days”.

He was “repeatedly shouting ‘Allahu Akbar’ while attempting to grab from his backpack an object that turned out to be a knife with a blade more than 12cm (nearly five inches) long,” they said in a statement.

The man was later found to be wanted by authorities in Algeria, suspected since 2015 of belonging to “Islamic State militias and employed in the Syrian-Iraqi theatre of war,” police said.

Police said the suspect was unknown to Italian authorities.

The man is currently in Milan’s San Vittore prison and awaiting extradition, they added.

Jihadist group IS proclaimed a “caliphate” in 2014 across swathes of Syria and Iraq, launching a reign of terror that continues with hit-and-run attacks and ambushes.

SHOW COMMENTS