WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama said on Tuesday the United States and France will stand united to fight Daesh following the Nov. 13 attacks in Paris, pledging to step up efforts to combat terrorism alongside its European partners.

“As Americans, we stand by our friends in good times and in bad, no matter what,” Obama said at a news conference with French President Francois Hollande at the White House.

Hollande is trying to rally support this week for a more coordinated international campaign to destroy Daesh He is due to visit Moscow on Thursday.

“The United States and France stand united, in total solidarity, to deliver justice to these terrorists ... and to defend our nations,” Obama said, adding that Daesh and its ideology “pose a serious threat to all of us.”

Hollande said the United States and France have agreed to step up strikes in Syria and Iraq to target Daesh Hollande said he and Obama agreed on the importance of closing the Turkish border to limit the movement of extremists into Europe.

Hollande’s meeting with Obama follows the attacks in Paris that killed 130 people at the national sports stadium, a concert venue and bars and restaurants in heart of the French capital. Daesh has claimed responsibility for the attack.

Obama said he and Hollande agreed that more needed to be done to combat Daesh’s efforts.

“US assistance has supported recent French strikes in Syria and we’re going to keep stepping up that coordination,” he said. “We will continue to do everything in our power to defend our nation.”

“We will win and groups like Daesh will lose,” Obama said, using an acronym for Daesh

“Viva la France,” Obama said.

On the Syrian crisis, Obama also said that Russian strikes against moderate opposition there only serve to bolster Syrian President Bashar Assad’s government.

Arrest warrant

Belgium issued an international arrest warrant on Tuesday for a man seen before the Paris attacks with Salah Abdeslam, the Brussels resident wanted over his suspected involvement in the killings of Nov. 13.

The state prosecutor, in a statement announcing details of other people charged in the case, said Mohamed Abrini, 30, had been filmed with Abdeslam at a fuel station in northern France two days before the attacks. Abrini was driving the Renault Clio car that was later used by the attackers in the French capital.

An accompanying police wanted poster described Abrini as “dangerous and probably armed.” The prosecutor said he had been filmed with Abdeslam around 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 11, at Ressons on the Paris-Brussels motorway.

The prosecutor also gave details of two people previously charged with terrorist offenses and said that a fifth, unnamed, person had been charged on Tuesday.

The only two people facing charges who had previously been named were Mohammed Amri and Hamza Attou. They admit to driving from Brussels to Paris to fetch Abdeslam hours after Abdeslam’s brother had blown himself up during the attacks but deny any knowledge of what Abdeslam had been doing in France.