Justice should bring together, on Friday, April 22, the survivors and relatives of the victims of the attack on 8 May 2002 to take stock of the “Security” component of this sprawling investigation.
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Twenty years, soon. Twenty years they drag their carcasses and nightmares. Twenty years that the bite of the absence torments the bereaved families. And that they expect acts from justice. Friday, April 22, Judge David De Pas must, according to our information, bring together the survivors and relatives of the victims of the 8 May 2002 attack in Karachi (Pakistan) to take stock of the “Security” component of this tentacular survey. . Eleven men of the Naval Construction Branch (DCN) had found death and twelve others had been seriously injured in the explosion of the bus that led them to the naval base where were assembled four French submarines sold in Pakistan.
This attack could have been avoided? Have the alarm signals been perceived at their just level? The safety measures taken, in the very tense context of the time, were they sufficient? Clearly, the answer to these last two questions is no. The Social Security Tribunal of Saint-Lô (Manche) had recognized in 2004 the “inexcusable fault” of the DCN, that is to say of the State, a judgment confirmed three years later by the Rennes Court of Appeal, entitled to compensation. But several victims, represented by M e Marie dosed, who wish to see the criminal responsibilities established on this issue, lodged a complaint of civil parties in 2012. It is this investigation, fallen in deletion after The regulatory departure of Judge Marc Trevidic, in 2015, who returns to the front of the stage.
The judge, coordinator of the anti-terrorism center in the Paris judicial court, heard many witnesses, including Yann B., in July 2021. This former military “gold ear”, the man loaded. In submarines to listen and analyze external noise (sonars, buildings, etc.), and integrated with the “special activity cell”, had already worked in 1998 on the armament of the first Underwater Agosta. Four years later, it is recalled by its company, International Council Defense, to operate on the second submarine. The following is it back to Karachi, as part of a “temporary group of companies” under the aegis of the DCN.
The chronology is important. At the time, the attacks of 11 September 2001 in the United States have just shake the world. Pakistan, deemed to support the Taliban in Afghanistan, is a country infested with various terrorist groups. The Americans somed up the authorities to clean up, an objective to support President Pakistani, General Pervez Musharraf. Yann B., he, must return to Toulon, early May, to ensure a training of representatives of the Singaporean Navy. Three weeks before his departure, accompanied by Jérôme Eustache, a colleague who also works on the Agosta, he goes to the travel agency next to the Hotel Awari Towers, where the French are housed, to buy his tickets from airplane.
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