It’s Go Time as Vast Security Operation Prepares for Start of Paris Olympics
The Summer Olympic Games are scheduled to begin with a unique Opening Ceremony flotilla down the iconic Seine river on Friday, 26 July. An unprecedented security operation accompanies the games, and as many as 75,000 security personnel will be deployed at any given time.
Two incidents during the last few days underscore how closely the games are being scrutinized around the world. Police are investigating a possible gang rape of an Australian woman in Paris. Authorities also arrested a Russian they say was plotting a “large-scale project” to disrupt the games—though they emphasized it was not a terrorism threat.
Few details have been released about the possible rape incident. A disoriented, 25-year-old woman sought refuge at a casual restaurant in the early morning hours of 20 July. Le Parisien (translated using Google translator) described the woman as a tourist who told police she was raped by five individuals. There are no reports that she is related to the Australian Olympic Team; however, the team was notified of the incident.
In the other incident, the BBC reported, “agents had discovered evidence that suggested the man was preparing ‘pro-Russian operations’ to destabilize France during the games.” Authorities have not released any additional details about the alleged plot, other than to say that the investigation is proceeding along a counter-espionage track rather than a counter-terrorism track.
The incident is one of string of incidents all related to Russia in some way. Last month, a Ukrainian-Russian man was arrested for detonating explosives in a hotel room near Paris, and three individuals were arrested and accused of placing coffins bearing the inscription “French soldiers of Ukraine” near the Eiffel Tower.
The French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin said authorities administered about 1 million background checks, which led to 5,000 people being blocked from attending the games. Of those, “there are 1,000 people whom we suspect of foreign interference—we can say spying,” Darmanin said.
He added that Russia was not the only county involved, but did not name the other parties.
The temporary bollards, fencing, and checkpoints that form part of the security apparatus for the games have created an almost surreal scene of Paris’s downtown core along the Seine. As one of the top tourist destinations in the world, if not the top, the neighborhoods bordering the Seine in the heart of Paris would normally be thick with tourists even in July heat.
However, only those few with the precious QR code needed for entry—and the thousands of security personnel—currently dot what would normally be crowded sidewalks and cafes. The security zone is hitting retailers within the zone hard.
“It’s a catastrophe,” one café owner told The New York Times. Another described it as being “inside a cage.”
There are hundreds of accounts like this one in the Times:
Pierre Brisson, who runs the Musée Vivant du Fromage, a museum on the Île Saint-Louis featuring cheese tasting tours, stood outside in a black beret with a glass of white wine, beckoning to a few stray passers-by.
A veteran cheesemaker, he had timed the opening last month to cater to what he thought would be a swell of customers.
Originally, the island was not supposed to be in the security perimeter. But authorities expanded it with little warning, Mr. Brisson said. Now he had no customers and was facing €50,000 in costs.
There is hope that after the Opening Ceremonies, the number of barricades and security checkpoints will reduce quickly. Still, the number of tourists expected for the Paris Olympics has fallen from 15 million to 11 million in what Air France called “significant Paris avoidance behavior.”
Some of the preliminary sporting contests have already begun. The 2024 Paris Olympics proper will begin with the Opening Ceremony at 2:00 p.m. Paris time on 26 July. If all goes well, the games will conclude with the Closing Ceremony on 11 August.