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As the trial over the November 2015 attacks continues in Paris, British and Irish survivors of the slaughter at the Bataclan will address the court on Friday, adding their voices in English to the harrowing accounts from the mosh pit that night. They are among dozens of foreign plaintiffs – many having navigated through six years of anguish, isolation and paperwork from abroad – seeking closure from the trial in Paris. FRANCE 24 spoke with some of the British victims set to testify.
On that grim Friday night six years ago, Islamic State group terrorists killed 130 people in coordinated mass shootings and suicide bombings at the Bataclan music hall, on Paris restaurant terraces and outside the Stade de France football venue just north of the city. Nearly a quarter of those slain were foreign nationals. Many had gone to watch California rockers Eagles of Death Metal on stage at the Bataclan, where the attack claimed 90 lives.
Years in the making, a trial unprecedented in scale and befitting a 1-million-page investigation file began on September 8. Over the course of nine months, 20 stand accused in a special €8 million made-to-measure courtroom inside the historic Palais de Justice courthouse complex, a stone’s throw from Notre-Dame Cathedral in the heart of Paris. The verdict is expected next May.
As of Monday the court had registered 2,375 plaintiffs to the proceedings, including 215 foreign nationals and three French dual nationals of 36 different countries, from Mexico to Cameroon, Egypt to Japan. British plaintiffs make up the largest contingent with 27, followed by Serbs, Americans, Moroccans, Spaniards, Austrians and Italians. Hundreds of attack survivors and family members of the deceased are testifying before the court throughout October, most of them in French, with testimony in other languages aided by interpreters provided by the court.
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Source : france24
