Agnes Thibault, a spokeswoman for the Paris prosecutor's office, told NBC News that the fragment would be sent to a division of the French Defense Ministry in Toulouse to be examined in a few days. France is leading the official judicial investigation because the debris was found on French territory. The co-pilot and some of the victims also were French.
It appears now that the office of le procureur de la République in Paris takes the lead in investigating the disappearance of the aircraft. The Chief Prosecutor also took the lead role in investigating AF447.