France ignored Turkish intelligent’s calls about terror suspect's widow

Hayat Boumeddiene, 26, the wanted partner of one of the gunmen shot dead by police after three days high tensions in France, arrived in Turkey before the killings and is most likely in Syria now. She reportedly arrived to Turkey on Jan. 2 and stayed in Istanbul's Kadıköy district for two days before traveling to southern Turkey to cross into war-torn Syria.

During her stay, the National Intelligence Organization (MİT) tracked her moves and sought intelligence sharing from French counterparts, a request that the French authorities ignored. According to reports, Boumeddiene left Turkey on Jan. 8 and the GSM signal of her cellphone was last received from a region in northern Syria. Her crossing into Syria was immediately reported by the MİT to France.

Never convicted of a crime herself, Boumeddiene was being sought after as of Saturday by French police, who think she may have vital information about an extremist cell that her common law husband, shot dead by police, may have belonged to. In a 2010 interview with French counterterrorism police, Boumeddiene characterized herself as an observant Muslim, and her late common law husband Amedy Coulibaly, 32, who worked at the time for Coca-Cola, as somewhat of a party animal. Coulibaly "is not really very religious," Boumeddiene told police, according to the official judicial documents. "He likes to have a good time [and] all that." The pair wed in July 2009 in a religious ceremony not recognized by French law.