A July 14th like no other, but security issues still as present. For this police officer, the 2020 edition of the national holiday is placed "under the sign of vigilance in a particularly tense context". More than 30,000 police officers (including some 2,500 in Paris, as last year) were mobilized for the evening of July 13 alone. And their task was not made easier by the festive events organized (balls, open-air concerts) despite the epidemic.
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In Paris, the traditional fireworks and concert without audience takes place with a large exclusion zone and closings of metro stations. “In the absence of declared gatherings, improvised events , notes a specialist, such as giant aperitifs, are very difficult to control. It is often impossible even to identify a manager who can become a point of contact in the event of tensions. ”
Three risks to consider
At the end of the afternoon, Monday, the police operational center started operating at Place Beauvau. Coordinated by the general direction of the national police and also bringing together representatives of the gendarmerie, the police headquarters and the fire brigade, it allows, thanks to radio messages and videos, to follow in real time the events occurring in France. . For the Interior, three risks hang over this July 14. The terrorist risk, first of all, always present, with an upstream dialogue between the police and local elected officials for the definition of “sanctuarized” zones and the alerting of intervention teams in the event of a drama.
Thanks to the system put in place, the army ensures that it can detect an object of 20 cm several kilometers away.For the protection of the parade, the air force deployed its anti-drone surveillance means at the top of the Arc de Triomphe. The threat is serious, within the reach of a large number of actors, and potentially difficult to detect in an urban environment as dense as Paris. Thanks to the system put in place, the army ensures that it can detect an object of 20 cm several kilometers away. Lieutenant-Colonel Zlatko, an expert in the fight against drones, remains discreet about the means of interception available to the military. "By detecting it from a distance, we can identify the object, determine whether it is hostile or not and locate the remote pilot," he said, adding that the army had "coercive means" to neutralize a threatening object ...
Second issue, that of public order with the efforts of the most determined "yellow vests", which, according to a police officer, "even if they only represent a few hundred people, are trying to graft themselves onto other causes" . Will be observed the parade of "Angry Citizens", scheduled from 9 am on the Champs-Élysées, "against this system, this government and Macron". Other parades are expected in Perpignan, Lyon and Toulouse. Third and last risk, finally, that of urban violence, with attention paid to the difficult neighborhoods of large suburbs, but also to small or medium-sized cities like Flers or Alençon (Orne), Angers or Le Pouzin (Ardèche)…
