Perpignan (AFP) – The three men accused of being responsible for the fire that killed eight people in February 2022 in the Pyrénées-Orientales were questioned for the first time on Friday, on the second day of their trial before the Assize Court.
Published on: 02/10/2026 - 23:32
"I am sorry for all the victims, even if I have nothing to reproach myself for. They are like my family. And this grocery store was like my baby. I could never have done that," declared Khaled Ben Abdeljelil, 46, suspected of having ordered the fire of his own business with the aim of collecting an insurance premium.
“My heart hurts for the dead, but I never did that,” assured his brother Raouf, 44, shortly after.
The third accused, Madjid Mekhelfi, a 32-year-old undocumented migrant who admitted to setting the fire, claims to have done it at the request of Khaled Ben Abdeljelil, in exchange for future employment and a helping hand in obtaining his papers.
"I'm here for the truth, for the children who left. I still see the photos in my head. Of course I'm ashamed. I never thought something like that would happen. I regret having met them. It's them who gave me this problem," he said, about the two other accused.
"I had a very good relationship with them. I spent the afternoons at the grocery store, I played with Khaled's daughter and the children in the building who died," he recalled, while the two brothers downplayed the links they had with him.
The fire, which caused the death of eight people, including five from the same family, broke out on the night of February 13 to 14, 2022, in a grocery store in the center of Saint-Laurent-de-la-Salanque, a town of 10,000 inhabitants close to the Mediterranean coast, before quickly spreading to homes at numbers 9 and 11 on rue Arago.
The family living above the business survived, but in the neighboring building, young parents aged 20 died with their two children aged four and 18 months, as well as the father of the young woman, as did three people residing in other apartments in the small building.
Investigators from the Montpellier research section have ruled out the hypothesis of an accidental fire, as expert assessments have established that gasoline was sprayed in the grocery store.
Fifty-five people became civil parties to this trial.
© 2026 AFP
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