Paris attacks suspect Salah Abdeslam gets 20-year sentence in Brussels trial

A Belgian judge on Monday sentenced Salah Abdeslam, the prime surviving suspect in the 2015 Islamic State attacks on Paris, to 20 years in prison over a shootout with police in Brussels in 2016.

Abdeslam’s co-defendant Sofien Ayari also received a 20-year term for attempted terrorist murder.

While his lawyer argued Abdeslam, 28, should be acquitted because of a procedural error, prosecutors had charged him with attempted murder over the Brussels shootout in March 2016, days before his arrest, and called for a jail term of 20 years.

Reporting by Robert-Jan Bartunek; editing by Philip Blenkinsop