ISIS are preparing a CHEMICAL attack, warns French PM

Manuel Valls made the ominous prediction while calling on French MPs to extend the country's state of emergency for another three months, amid fears another attack is imminent.

The warning comes as U.S. security officials report that they have found proof that ISIS is developing bio-weapons with the help of Syrian and Iraqi scientists in the Middle East.

Speaking in the French Parliament today, Mr Valls said: 'Terrorism hit France, not because of what it is doing in Iraq and Syria... but for what it is.'

He added: 'We must not rule anything out. I say it with all the precautions needed. 

'But we know and bear in mind that there is also a risk of chemical or bacteriological weapons.

'The macabre imagination of the masterminds is limitless.' 

His warning came shortly before it was confirmed that the suspected engineer of last week's Paris attacks was killed in the police raid of an apartment north of the capital.

Valls told Parliament to applause from lawmakers that Abdelhamid Abaaoud, a 28-year-old Belgian ISIS militant, had been confirmed killed in Wednesday's six-hour siege in a Paris suburb.

Abaaoud is said to have planned the coordinated attacks on the Stade de France, cafes and the Bataclan, a music venue, which left 129 dead.

But it is also believed that he is behind four out of six terror plots which French authorities have foiled since the spring.

Abaaoud - who had been living in Syria - had previously boasted of mounting terrorist attacks in Europe.

'We know today ... that the mastermind of the attacks - or one of them, let's remain cautious - was among those dead,' Mr Valls told reporters outside Parliament.

It was later confirmed the Belgian terrorist had been killed, shot by a sniper before his body was blown up be grenades.

He was identified using DNA found in saliva. 

The French authorities will now have to explain how they allowed the known terrorist, who was thought to be in Syria, to operate so freely in their country, killing 129 people in the process.

'This is a major failing,' said Roland Jaquard, from the International Observatory for Terrorism. 

(dailymail.co.uk)