Paris Attacks: 115,000 Security Officers Mobilized across France
More than 115,000 security personnel have been mobilized in the wake of Friday’s Paris attacks by ISIS, Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve has announced.
Bernard Cazeneuve said 128 more raids on suspected militants were carried out. French air strikes also hit Islamic State in Syria overnight.
ISIS has said it carried out the attacks on bars, restaurants, the Bataclan concert hall and Stade de France stadium in which 129 people died.
A huge manhunt is under way for one of the suspects, Salah Abdeslam.
Salah Abdeslam is believed to have fled across the border to his native Belgium. Belgian police have released more pictures of the wanted man.
Photo Reuters
Belgium’s government has raised its terror threat level because of the failure so far to arrest Salah Abdeslam.
Bernard Cazeneuve said: “We have mobilized 115,000 police, gendarmes and military over the whole of our national territory to insure the protection of French people.”
He vowed to boost funding for police equipment, which he said had fallen by 17% between 2007 and 2012.
The interior minister added that 128 raids on suspected Islamist militants had been carried out overnight on November 16 to 17. More than 160 raids were made earlier on November 16, with 23 people arrested and dozens of weapons seized.
French media reported that during raids police found a safe house used by the attackers in Bobigny, a suburb of Paris.
Meanwhile France has evoked a previously unused clause in the Treaty on European Union obliging other member states to provide it with “aid and assistance by all means in their power”.
Within minutes, EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said that all 28 member states had offered “full support and readiness to provide all the aid and assistance needed”.
The measures came as US Secretary of State John Kerry visited Paris.
Speaking on November 16, John Kerry described ISIS as “psychopathic monsters”.
After meeting French President Francois Hollande on November 17, John Kerry said everyone understood that after Paris and other recent attacks “we have to step up efforts to hit them at the core” and improve border security.
President Francois Hollande is due to fly to Washington and Moscow next week for talks with Presidents Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin.