Judge puts terror arsenal suspect under investigation

Abderezak Besseghir, the baggage handler arrested after an arsenal of explosives and guns was found in his car at Charles de Gaulle airport near Paris was yesterday placed under formal investigation by a French terrorism judge.

A second man, described as a 43-year-old Algerian family friend, is also being investigated, a step short of being charged. He recently entered France on false papers and was at the Besseghir family home.

Police said they were not ruling out Mr Besseghir's claim that he is the target of a bizarre and ambitious set-up, orchestrated by his former in-laws after the death of his wife in a fire in July last year. But officers also said the arms and explosives may have been destined for a terror attack and M Besseghir was acting as a messenger.

A police source said: "The parcel could have come from abroad. He could have collected it from the hold of a plane and taken it to his car, not knowing its contents. Employees' vehicles are not checked when they leave the airport.''

M Besseghir, 27, was arrested last Saturday after border police had a tip-off from a witness. The witness, a former French Foreign Legionnaire known as Marcel L, claimed to have seen M Besseghir handling a weapon in his car, parked at Terminal 2F. In the car, police found an automatic pistol, a machine-gun, five 200-gram cakes of Tolite military-grade explosive, two detonators and a slow fuse. They also discovered literature of a religious and anti-Israeli nature "but not Islamist'', and pages from a catalogue showing pilots' uniforms.

The formal investigation covers the suspects' possible links with a terrorist organisation, breach of arms legislation, immigration rules and use of false documents.

Marcel L, who has a conviction for arms trafficking, was arrested and released on Tuesday after M Besseghir claimed he was a friend of his former step-parents. Police said M Besseghir's adamant claim that he knew nothing about the arms and explosives in the boot of his black Peugeot 206 had led them consider seriously his claims of a family plot.

Yesterday, his 21-year-old sister, Samira, told Agence France Presse her brother was "the obvious victim of a family plot'' and that "his western lifestyle proves he is not in a terrorist organisation''.

M Besseghir's 25-year-old wife, Louisa Bechiri, died in hospital after a fire at the couple's house in Bondy, Paris. A police inquiry found she had killed herself. Samira Besseghir said Louisa's family believed her brother had killed her, and had not ceased to harass him.

Ms Bechiri's parents were quoted by French newspapers yesterday as saying M Besseghir "behaved like a Taliban'', that he beat their daughter and that, on the day she died, she had packed her suitcase to walk out.