ISTANBUL
The Paris prosecutor’s office said Wednesday that the suspects behind decapitated pig heads found outside mosques in the Ile-de-France region earlier this week are foreign nationals who immediately fled the country after the acts.
The desecrations took place overnight Sept. 9 in Paris, Malakoff, Montreuil, Montrouge and Gentilly.
Prosecutors said the acts were committed “by foreign nationals” who “immediately left the country,” in what they described as a “clear desire to provoke unrest within the nation," BFM TV broadcaster reported.
A farmer in Normandy alerted investigators after selling around 10 pig heads to two men, whose vehicle carried Serbian license plates.
CCTV analysis later showed the same car in Paris, with footage capturing two suspects leaving pig heads outside mosques.
Investigators believe the suspects may have used a Croatian telephone line, which was tracked crossing the French-Belgian border early Tuesday, shortly after the desecrations.
The Civil Liberties Protection Section of the Paris prosecutor’s office has taken over the investigation under charges of “intentional violence” linked to religion and “serving the interests of a foreign power.”
The offense carries up to six years in prison.
Authorities are also pursuing charges of “public incitement to hatred or violence” based on origin, ethnicity or religion, which carries a one-year prison sentence.