TheCable

President Francois Hollande has declared that France is at war with Islamic State (ISIS), following hours of gun battle on Wednesday in his country’s capital, Paris.

The attack, which was as a result of a police raid on a residence in Saint Denis, a Paris suburb where the terrorists  involved in the Friday attacks are believed to be hiding, lead to hours of gun duel.

The gun battle led to an arrest of seven suspected terrorists and the death of two others, as one of the women involved blew up herself, wounding several policemen.

Hollande, who addressed the nation after the gun violence, said the attacks were making France “suddenly weak”.

“These actions confirm to us once again, that we are at war, a war against terrorism, which itself has decided to bring war to us,” Hollande said while addressing the nation.

“It is the Jihadist organisation Daesh (ISIS) which has an army, financial resources, oil resources, and occupies a territory. It has accomplices in Europe and in our own country, together with young radicalised Islamist, it commits barbarous massacres

“It wants to kill, it has killed during the night of November, at least 129 people lost their lives. We are thinking of them, we are thinking of their families who are in this terrible grief.

“These attacks which have made Paris suddenly weak, and concerns French people wherever they live because it was the entire country that was attacked”.

According to CNN, Francois Molins, the Paris prosecutor, said that Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the suspected ringleader of the Paris attacks, was one of the potential targets of the police raid.