Recently, there was sabotage coupled with terrorist activities carried out on French high-speed rail networks, a major problem in the country handling the Paris Olympics task is Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin. Thus, the fast arrest promise has not yet been fulfilled, they have not found a single suspect.
Thus, Sports Minister Amélie Oudéa-Castéra reassured the public saying that such individuals would not be able to ruin the upcoming event. However, the attackers chose the TGV network only several hours before the opening ceremony and thus created many problems for the travelers, not to mention that this symbol of French technical progress has now proved to be very weak against such attacks.
Caretaker Prime Minister Gabriel Attal also chose not to jump to conclusions stating that the attackers seemed well aware of how to cause the most deaths. First, an idea was named from security sources that coup plotters were ultra-left radicals but no group has taken the responsibility. The techniques employed like burning critical fiber optics and cables were similar to other sabotage by the extreme left wing. Yet these seemingly uncoordinated acts of terror strike four different areas, which points to the fact that the level of coordination is much higher as compared to usual groups involved in terrorist acts.
When selecting facilities to attack the attackers appeared to have been inspired by the Paris Olympics. TGV arteries in the north, east, and west were shut down and the high-speed connection to the southeast was almost affected, if not for the vigil engineering team which noticed some suspicious-looking vans.
Local offices of authorities are now gathering evidence with the supervision of the national police, national gendarmerie, and the anti-terrorism SDAT. Their main hope rests in hunting down the men who escaped the scene near Vergigny as well as the incendiary items.
There has been previous targeting on French railways, for example, in January 2023, east of Paris, and another attempt in early May 2024 near Aix-en-Provence. The second one took place when the Olympic flame came to Marseille, which repeated the recent sabotage in terms of approach.
The interior minister had earlier reported an extra high external threat, and possibly Jihadists, exactly like the recent incident at Crocus City Hall in Moscow. France has suffered jihadist attacks in the recent past, although none of them has been of the extent of sabotage experienced in the rail network. Criminal incidents that occurred on Friday affected the movement of tens of thousands of people but no loss of life was reported.
Russia also stays on the list of suspicions due to full-scale aggression against Ukraine and an intensive disinformation campaign against France. Russian trolls have complained about the Paris Games and started to bash Emmanuel Macron. Although formally Moscow denies respective allegations, the French authorities do believe that it has something to do with multiple social disturbances in Paris.
Recently a Russian national was captured in Paris for purported planning of acts of destabilization, interference, and spying. However, this does not directly point to Russia about the recent rail sabotage because the attackers had insider knowledge of France’s railway work, which could not be easily gotten by foreign states.
Jean-Pierre Farandou of the state-owned rail company SNCF said that targets selected by the saboteurs would inflict the most damage. The attack at Courtalain destroyed two communication lines on the " CHS" communication to the regions of Brittany and Bordeaux. Another attack distorted the speedy lines to Metz and Strasbourg.
Security expert Romain de Calbiac moved to indicate that the attack could have been very well coordinated, hinting that insiders or foreign nations could have information on the French system. SNCF had already noticed that acts of vandalism that target the rail network have risen and had been careful, especially in the period before the Olympic and Paralympic Games. Thus, activists tried everything in their power, but fortunately, only one of the attacks could have been stopped from inflicting major harm.
He said, today must have been a day of feast, today must have been a day to rejoice as Jean-pierre Farandou. However, that has all been destroyed
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