Salah Abdeslam, during his last word at the attack trial on Monday, asked the jury to try him like the others, even if he is the “mediatized and demonized Salah Abdeslam”.
An emotional Abdeslam began his final words with a message of support for the victims of the earthquake in Morocco. He then addressed the victims of the attacks first, asking them not to listen to what was said in the media. “I do have empathy for you, your testimonies follow me to my cell, I have questioned myself. I am not proud that women and men are disfigured and injured.”
He also reiterated that he has taken responsibility for his part in the attacks in Paris, but that he did not know what was going to happen on March 22, 2016. “They say that the apartment in Driesstraat had cardboard walls, but also that Belkaid and Ayari (the other residents of the apartment, ed.) had nothing to do with the attacks and Abdeslam did,” he said.
“I am being harassed legally, but people do not dare to complain about it. And I’m not saying that justice shouldn’t be done. The punishments will never be enough for what happened, 35 people were killed. The indictment corresponds to the facts, but does not correspond to the people in the box.”
Strict for jury
Abdeslam was also tough on the jury, which he said wrongly found him guilty of terrorist murder. “To err is human, but I am the mediatized, demonized Salah Abdeslam, anything is possible,” he said. “When you return to your normal lives, it is difficult to live with the idea that you have condemned someone who does not deserve it.”
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