Salah Abdeslam, who is believed to have been involved in the Paris terror attacks in November, has contacted a Belgian defense attorney and could be making plans to surrender to authorities, Belgian media reported Thursday.
Mr. Abdeslam, 26, contacted Brussels-based lawyer Sven Mary, according to news agencies Belga and Het Laastste Nieuws.
Mr. Mary declined to comment on the reports.
If the reports are true, it could indicate that Mr. Abdeslam is making preparations to hand himself over to police, who have been hunting him down since the Nov. 13 attacks that left 130 dead.
Belgian police have conducted a series of raids on houses and flats in various parts of the country in a bid to find him.
Mr. Abdeslam is alleged to have helped organize the Paris attacks by hiring cars and renting hotel rooms for the Islamic State terrorists who carried out the shootings and bombings.
His older brother, Ibrahim, was one of the suicide bombers in the attacks.
Mr. Abdeslam was last seen when two friends dropped him in a suburb of Brussels.
His family in Belgium urged him to surrender to police in media interviews.
“I would rather see my brother in prison than in a cemetery,” one of his brothers, Mohammed Abdeslam, said in an interview with broadcaster RTBF. “The best thing would be for him to hand himself in so that the authorities can work out exactly what’s happened,” he said in another interview.
• Kellan Howell can be reached at khowell@washingtontimes.com.
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