From July 26 to August 11, 2024, France will host 10,500 Olympic and 4,350 Paralympic athletes from 205 nations, 40 competition venues, 6,000 journalists, 40,000 volunteers, 45,000 law enforcement forces. Thirteen million tickets are on sale.
Safety is therefore an absolute priority. Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin reiterated this at a press conference on Tuesday, three and a half months ahead of the opening ceremony of the XXXIII Modern Olympics.
In these troubled times of war and terrorist attacks around the world, nothing can be left to chance or improvisation.
Crossing Paris on the Seine
A total of 45,000 police officers and gendarmes will be mobilized to secure the capital during the two weeks of the Olympic Games. During the opening ceremony, the elite GIGN and RAID units will help to keep the banks of the Seine under control, as for the first time in the world, the ceremony will take place outside a stadium. The six-kilometer-long river crossing of Paris will begin near the Pont d’Austerlitz and end in front of the Trocadéro, where 120 heads of state and government will be welcomed. Some 600,000 spectators are expected to attend the festivities on the quays and bridges of Paris.
A billion television viewers are expected for this grandiose ceremony, with 160 boats sailing down the Seine with the athletes.
Exceptional security measures
In the run-up to the Games, Parisians and tourists alike will have to comply with strict security rules. This includes the use of a QR code, which is required to move around Paris. According to Gérald Darmanin, some 15 metro stations will be closed during the Games, and tourist sites will be accessible via entrances other than those on the metro.
Traffic will be cut off a week before the opening in the areas concerned.
Several screening procedures have already been carried out on volunteers. According to the Minister of the Interior, 195,000 accredited persons have been screened. 161 people on the “S” list have been eliminated, including 105 for radical Islam, 35 for belonging to the ultra-right, 18 to the ultra-left and 3 for foreign interference.
Finally, out of 285,000 security guards, 1,392 had their professional card withdrawn, either because they had a criminal record, or because they were in an irregular situation.
JO de Paris: quand faudra-t-il son QR Code? Gérald Darmanin détaille les différents cas de figure pic.twitter.com/b2Y9pe84pL
— BFMTV (@BFMTV) April 9, 2024