Story highlights

Ringleader Abaaoud was planning attack on financial district on November 18 or 19, prosecutor says

Mohamed Abrini is wanted by authorities for his alleged role in the attacks

Another suspect's phone was traced to the area where suspected suicide vest was found

Paris CNN  — 

French authorities working to dismantle the terrorist network behind the Paris attacks say another attack could have been hours away when police closed in on the suspects’ hideaway last week.

Another attack could have been just hours away when police closed in on the suspects’ hideaway last week.

Suspected ringleader Abdelhamid Abaaoud and another man were planning a suicide attack on the Paris financial district of La Defense on November 18 or 19, Paris prosecutor Francois Molins said Tuesday. Both men were killed during a raid in Saint-Denis that caused the collapse of a floor of an apartment building.

The prosecutor did not elaborate on how authorities deduced the plot was in the works.

And while Molins’ latest statement to reporters provided new details about a closely-watched investigation, several key questions remain unanswered:

• Where is suspect Salah Abdeslam?

• Did a suicide vest investigators found in a Paris suburb this week belong to him? Was it intended for another attack that never happened?

• Who is the man who was killed after he detonated a suicide vest during the Saint-Denis raid last Wednesday? Was he involved in the Paris attacks?

Here’s a look at some other developments:

The suspects on the run

It’s been more than a week since an international arrest warrant went out for Abdeslam.

Investigators haven’t detailed what they believe his role in the coordinated series of shootings and bombings was, but Molins offered a theory: Abdeslam may have driven suicide bombers to the Stade de France, dropped them off and then made his way to another Paris neighborhood. Why? His fingerprints, Molins said, were found in a car connected with the attacks, and particularly on the key.

The hunt for Abdeslam has stretched to several countries in Western Europe, but so far, he hasn’t been spotted since authorities named him as a suspect.

Mohamed Abrini

Belgium, and specifically a Brussels suburb with a history of links to terrorism, have been a focus of the investigation.

Sources in France close to the investigation believe Abdeslam could not have survived so long on the run without help, which might involve a support network in Belgium. They say extensive raids in Belgium on Sunday and Monday – in which 21 people were detained – targeted people suspected of helping organize the attacks.

Belgian authorities released the name and photo of another suspect, saying they’re searching for him in connection with the Paris attacks.

Police said Mohamed Abrini was driving another car that was found abandoned in a Paris neighborhood where one of the November 13 shootings occurred. They said he had dropped off one of the bombers who attacked the Stade de France.

The suicide vest

A suicide vest found in a garbage bin could give investigators new clues about Abdeslam’s whereabouts. They are analyzing the vest, which was found in the Paris suburb of Montrouge, near where Abdeslam’s cell phone was traced the night of the attacks, prosecutor Molins said.

Investigators are still analyzing the vest, which was found in the Paris suburb of Montrouge near locations where Abdeslam’s cell phone was traced on the night of the attacks, Molins said.

CNN affiliate BFMTV reported the vest contained bolts and TATP, the same explosive as the suicide belts the Paris attackers used.

Questions have been raised over whether Abdeslam aborted part of the attacks before fleeing toward Belgium. The Paris prosecutor suggested that could have been the case, noting that an ISIS message claiming responsibility for the attacks mentioned the 18th arrondissement, a Paris neighborhood where no attack occurred.

“Our investigation on that is still ongoing, to determine if Salah was planning on a suicide attack in the 18th arrondissement and why it didn’t happen,” Molins said.

Complete coverage of the Paris attacks

“It is possible that somebody else may have jettisoned it, an attacker that we don’t know much about at this point,” Cruickshank said. “So they’ll be doing all sorts of forensics, trying to establish who this belonged to, and that will be a huge priority for French investigators.”

Authorities in Montrouge said garbage cans there are emptied “once or twice a week,” Le Monde reported.

The global battle against ISIS

French President Francois Hollande is in the midst of a week of diplomacy aimed at building a global coalition to fight ISIS in Syria and Iraq.

A French fighter jet takes off from the carrier Charles de Gaulle on Monday.

He held talks Wednesday with German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Paris. The two visited the Place de la Republique, the site of a memorial to victims of the November 13 attacks, to lay flowers before their talks.

France and Britain are already part of a U.S.-led coalition that has been bombing ISIS targets. Russia is conducting separate airstrikes against ISIS and other groups in coordination with the forces of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Any efforts to form an alliance that includes both Russia and the United States are likely to run into thorny issues such as Assad’s future role in Syria and international sanctions against Russia for its interference in Ukraine.

Hollande has vowed to intensify the aerial campaign against ISIS targets, and the French military began Monday to use the aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle in the eastern Mediterranean to launch strikes.

Complete coverage of Paris attacks

CNN’s Margot Haddad reported from Paris, Catherine Shoichet and Ashley Fantz reported and wrote from Atlanta, and Jethro Mullen wrote from Hong Kong. CNN’s Tim Lister, Ralph Ellis, Evan Perez and Shimon Prokupecz contributed to this report.