Paris Attacks: David Cameron, Standing 'Shoulder To Shoulder' With France, Agrees To Increase Counterterrorism Cooperation

UPDATE: 6:10 a.m. EST -- British Prime Minister David Cameron said Monday that he offered France the use of a British airbase in Cyprus for airstrikes against the Islamic State group in Syria, and to assist with refueling French jets. France stepped up its anti-ISIS offensive in Syria earlier this month in response to the attacks in Paris on Nov. 13 that killed 130 people.

"Today I have offered President Hollande the use of RAF Akrotiri for French aircraft engaged in counter-ISIL operations and additional assistance with air-to-air refuelling," Cameron said, in a statement released Monday, following a press briefing in Paris.

Original story:

France and the U.K. will increase counterterrorism cooperation and intelligence-sharing, British Prime Minister David Cameron announced during a joint press conference Monday with French President François Hollande in Paris.

“I firmly support the action that President Hollande has taken to strike ISIL [Islamic State group] in Syria and it is my firm conviction that Britain should do so too,” Cameron reportedly said Monday.

Hollande, on his part, stressed that France -- which stepped up its anti-ISIS offensive in response to the Paris attacks earlier this month that killed 130 people -- will continue to target the militant group in Syria.

“We will intensify our strikes, choosing targets that will do the most damage possible to this army of terrorists,” Hollande, who has previously called for a global coalition to defeat ISIS, reportedly said.

Additionally, Cameron, who is to announce a drastic increase in U.K.’s defense expenditure later Monday, also said that he will present a "comprehensive" plan of action regarding Syria to the British parliament later this week. The British prime minister, along with the U.K.’s Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne, has been pushing to secure parliamentary support for a motion to extend its air campaign against ISIS to Syria.

ISIS has, over the past few months, intensified attacks outside Syria and Iraq -- where it still controls vast swathes of territories. In addition to the Paris attacks, the militant group also claimed responsibility for last month’s bombing in Beirut, which killed over 30 people, and the downing of a Russian passenger plane over Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula in October, which killed 224 people.

“President Hollande and I are united in our determination to defeat the evil death cult, ISIL,” Cameron tweeted, after the press conference.

Ahead of the joint press conference, Cameron stood “shoulder to shoulder” with the French president at the Bataclan concert hall, where 89 people were killed on Nov. 13. As of now, despite a Europe-wide manhunt, Salah Abdeslam -- one of the suspected Paris attackers -- remains at large.