Gérald Darmanin announces 45,000 police and gendarmes mobilized, an “exceptional device”

2023-07-12 16:11:49

The government wants to be fully prepared for the risk of incidents. To do this, it sets up an “exceptional device”. During a press briefing, Gérald Darmanin announced on Wednesday that, each evening, 45,000 police and gendarmes will be mobilized on July 13 and 14 and specially “equipped to fight against urban violence”.

This deployment uses the “same modus operandi as during the riots” which followed the death of young Nahel, killed by a policeman in Nanterre on June 27. It will include elite units from the RAID, GIGN and BRI as well as helicopters and armored vehicles from the gendarmerie, added Gérald Darmanin to the press.

“Guarantee maximum security”

From the evening of July 13 to the morning of July 15, a total of 130,000 “police, gendarmes and agents” will be mobilized, as well as 40,000 firefighters per night, according to the minister. The Paris police headquarters said that 10,000 members of the police would be deployed in the capital, where a concert is planned at the Trocadéro and the traditional fireworks display on the Champs de Mars, and the departments of the inner suburbs. .

“It is a question of guaranteeing maximum security so that our fellow citizens enjoy the celebration without suffering the inconvenience of a few offenders and a great firmness towards those who would like to spoil these nights of national celebration with a systematic arrest instruction , as I had given it” during the nights of riots, declared the minister. Throughout the country, with a few exceptions, buses and trams will again stop earlier in the evening.

Cancellations of festivities

The authorities also want to enforce the decree prohibiting the sale of firework “mortars”, of which “150,000” copies have been seized since June 27, announced Gérald Darmanin. Finally, demonstrations “linked to the riots”, according to the minister, such as the one that the Adama Traoré Committee wanted to organize last Saturday to denounce police violence, may be prohibited at the request of the prefects until July 15.

Several municipalities, particularly in Ile-de-France (Nanterre, Gennevilliers, Sartrouville or Savigny-sur-Orge) and in the North (in particular Roubaix and Mons-en-Barœul), have chosen to cancel their traffic lights. artifice, or even all of the festivities planned for the National Day. In 2022, 807 people were arrested during incidents across the country on the sidelines of the July 14 festivities, 749 vehicles burned and 55 law enforcement officers injured, recalled Gérald Darmanin.