Abdelhamid Abaaoud: Paris attacks ringleader was near Bataclan during concert shooting massacre, says Paris prosecutor

Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the so-called 'ringleader' of the Paris attacks, returned to the scene of the crime while the shootings were still underway, the Paris prosecutor Francois Molins told a news conference.

Molins said that Abaaoud boarded a metro train going back to the centre of Paris after the attacks began, and said the phone he was believed to be using was detected in the city's 10th, 11th and 12th arrondissements, and by the Bataclan concert hall while attacks there were still going on.

Abaaoud was killed by police in the raid on an apartment in the Parisian suburb of Saint-Denis, which took place five days after the attacks in the centre of Paris.

According to French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve, Abaaoud played a "decisive role" in the attacks, and had been implicated in a number of previous attacks, including the attempted shooting on a French high-speed train which was foiled by off-duty American soldiers.

Immediately following the attacks, Abaaoud was thought to be in Syria or Isis-controlled territories in the Middle East.

The fact that the Belgian-born terrorist was in Paris the whole time came as a shock to investigators.

Now, with the prosecutor saying Abaaoud travelled around central Paris while the attacks were underway, it appears that he was even closer than previously thought.