Al-Qaeda’s revenge: Bloody end to French hostage crisis as 20 die

As the French hostage crisis came to a bloody end last night with the loss of 20 lives, al-Qaeda claimed it had directed the attack against the satirical magazine ‘Charlie Hebdo’ in Paris "as revenge for the honour" of Islam’s Prophet Mohammed.

A member of the Yemen branch of the terror group gave a statement to Associated Press which said its leadership “directed the operations and they have chosen their target carefully”.

The al-Qaeda statement said the attack was in line with warnings from the late Osama bin Laden to the West about “the consequences of the persistence in the blasphemy against Muslim sanctities”.